Education Finance

Public spending on education has never reached the six per cent of GDP target set in 1968

The six per cent target dates to the Kothari Commission in 1968 and is restated in NEP 2020; it has never been met in nearly six decades. Reported current levels differ substantially between sources — the Economic Survey's combined centre-and-state figure is far lower than other published figures — because they count different things: Union-only against combined, budget estimates against actual expenditure. No single percentage is recorded here for that reason; establish which measure the party will use and use it consistently everywhere. What is consistent across every source is that the actual level is well below the target, that the Union's own direct share is a small fraction of the total with states carrying the majority of the burden, and that education's share of the Union budget has fallen from around 3% to around 2.6% since 2019-20. Evidence confidence: High for the qualitative finding and the six-decade shortfall; Low for any single current percentage, which is why none is entered.