Analysing inequalities in access and household investment in market-based supplemental educational services in India: A case of post-compulsory school education in Haryana

ABSTRACT

The paper, based on a primary survey, explores the inequalities in access and household investment on the market-based ‘supplemental educational services’ (SESs) in post-compulsory school education (i.e. secondary level of education) in Haryana, a northern state in India. We find that around 44% of students access SESs in secondary education in Haryana, and it varies considerably across socioeconomic groups such as class, caste and gender. Results from the two-step Heckman selection model suggest that access to and household investment in SESs is significantly determined by household factors and school characteristics. We also find that SESs in Haryana are not homogenous, vary widely in content delivery and private costs. Nearly 56% of the students (mainly from socio-economically underprivileged groups) attend the low-cost and low-quality private tuition centres, while their better-off counterparts attend the more organised medium- and high-cost tuition services, and this widens the already existing inequality in educational opportunities in the state. The study suggests to stringently regulate the flourishing commercial SESs market to minimise growing educational inequality in the state.

KEYWORDS:

• Supplemental educational services
• secondary education
• Heckman selection model
• household expenditure

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethical guidelines

It is certified and confirmed that the research meets the underlying ethical guidelines including adherence to the legal requirements of the study country.

Notes on contributors

Harvinder Singh is an assistant professor of economics at the University Institute of Legal Studies (UILS), Panjab University, Chandigarh (India). He works in the area of economics of education. He has recently completed Ph.D. on the topic ‘Household expenditure on secondary education in Haryana: A socio-economic Analysis’.

Angrej Singh Gill is working as faculty of Economics at Panjab University Rural Centre, Kauni (Sri Muktsar Sahib), Punjab (India). He has authored numerous research papers published in prominent research journals and edited books published by internationally reputed publishers like Sage, Routledge, Emerald, Palgrave Macmillan, etc.

Pradeep Kumar Choudhury is a Research Fellow at South Asia Institute at Harvard University, USA and an assistant professor of economics at Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India. He works in the area of development economics, with a specific focus on education. His recent work has centred on understanding the changing relationship between education and inequality in India, specifically finding out the effect of the growing private sector presence.

Notes

1. Close to 1.6 million students registered for the NEET exam in 2020 for around 75,000 Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) seats in India, with an increase of about 15% registered candidates than 2019. In 2020, more than 21 candidates competed for one MBBS seat in the NEET entrance exam in India. https://www.ndtv.com/education/neet-2020–20-candidates-to-vie-for-1-mbbs-seat-this-year-2163703 (accessed 20 November 2022).

2. For a detail discussion on the scheme, see https://www.education.gov.in/en/rmsa.

3. Before administering the survey tools, we have taken the consent from the respondents. The researchers explained to them about the objectives of the survey in detail and then asked them to express their willingness to participate in it. We included only those respondents who gave their consent to participate. Thus, while collecting data from the respondents, we duly followed all ethical procedures.