Kothari Commission and the First National Policy on Education (1968): A Milestone in Indian Education

When India gained independence in 1947, it inherited a deeply fragmented education system – one shaped by colonial priorities rather than national needs. Millions of children were out of school, rural communities had little access to quality education, and the curriculum bore little relevance to the challenges of a developing nation. It took nearly two decades of post-independence experience before the government took a decisive step: setting up the National Education Commission in 1964, popularly known as the Kothari Commission. Its findings became the blueprint for India’s first-ever National Policy on Education, passed in 1968 – a document that would shape Indian schooling for generations.

The Kothari Commission: who, what, and why 🔗

The Kothari Commission was established on 14 July 1964 under the chairmanship of Dr. Daulat Singh Kothari, then Chairman of the University Grants Commission (UGC). It was an ad hoc body appointed by the Government of India to examine every aspect of the country’s educational sector – from pre-primary schooling right up to university education – and recommend a coherent national framework. Medical and legal education were the only domains kept outside its scope.

The Commission was not a small or hurried exercise. It comprised 17 core members, including five international educationists from the UK, USSR, USA, France, and Japan. It also set up 12 task forces and 7 working groups covering specialised areas like higher education, manpower, teacher training, and adult literacy. Over 21 months, the Commission interviewed more than 9,000 scholars, educators, scientists, and administrators. It visited universities, schools, and colleges across India, and held open hearings to gather public input. The result was a comprehensive report titled Education and National Development, submitted on 29 June 1966.

Why was such a commission necessary in the first place? India’s education system faced significant disparities – particularly in access to quality education between rural and urban areas, different social groups, and genders. The curriculum was largely academic and disconnected from real-world needs. There was no standardised national structure. And despite two earlier commissions – the Radhakrishnan Commission on university education (1948-49) and the Secondary Education Commission (1952-53) – there had been no comprehensive, cross-level review of education. The Kothari Commission was the first of its kind.

The first National Policy on Education, 1968: “radical restructuring” 🔗

Based on the Kothari Commission’s recommendations, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s government announced the first National Policy on Education (NPE) in 1968 – the first time independent India had articulated a comprehensive, unified vision for education. The policy explicitly called for a “radical restructuring” of the educational system, with the twin goals of ensuring equal educational opportunity and driving national integration, cultural development, and economic growth.

This was not a minor administrative update. It was a 17-point agenda that touched teacher welfare, curriculum design, language policy, science education, vocational training, and financing. Several key recommendations of the Kothari Commission – including free and compulsory education, revision of teacher pay scales, equalisation of opportunity, and a focus on science – found direct expression in the 1968 NPE. The policy also formally adopted the 10+2+3 structure of schooling and higher education, which remains the backbone of India’s education system today.

Education for equitable access and national integration 🔗

One of the central commitments of the 1968 NPE was the universalisation of elementary education. As per Article 45 of the Indian Constitution, the policy aimed to fulfil the directive of free and compulsory education for all children up to the age of 14. This was a significant goal at the time, given that poverty rates had peaked at around 62% in the mid-1960s and millions of children – particularly girls, children from Scheduled Castes and Tribes, and those from rural areas – remained excluded from formal schooling.

The NPE gave special emphasis to these marginalised groups. It focused on students from rural, backward, and tribal areas, and gave particular attention to the education of girls and children with disabilities. A common school system was proposed to reduce the stark divide between well-resourced private institutions and under-funded government schools – a divide that effectively reproduced social inequality across generations.

National integration was also a defining goal. India in 1968 was a young republic still forging a shared national identity across hundreds of languages, dozens of religious communities, and deeply entrenched caste hierarchies. The policy framed education as a key instrument for building common citizenship – a sense that despite all differences, Indians shared a collective future. This meant designing a curriculum that reflected national values while still respecting regional diversity.

Linking education to economic development 🔗

The Kothari Commission was explicit that education could not be separated from the country’s economic ambitions. The Commission highlighted that increasing national productivity required science education and work experience to be made an integral part of all education – not optional additions, but core components of what every student learns.

To that end, the 1968 NPE made science and mathematics compulsory at the end of the schooling stage. It also promoted education for agriculture and industry, recognising that the majority of India’s workforce at that time was employed in farming. Vocational training was integrated into secondary education to ensure that students leaving school were better prepared for employment. The Commission also recommended establishing at least one agricultural university per state and building industry-education partnerships so that technical training remained relevant to actual employment needs.

The three-language formula: ambition and resistance 🔗

Perhaps no aspect of the 1968 NPE generated more debate than the three-language formula. India’s linguistic landscape is extraordinarily diverse – the country has hundreds of languages and distinct regional identities tied closely to language. The question of which languages to teach in schools was – and remains – deeply political.

The policy outlined the three-language formula to be implemented in secondary education: instruction in English, the official language of the state where the school was based, and Hindi. The intent was to promote multilingualism in a way that served both regional and national purposes. Students in non-Hindi-speaking states would learn their mother tongue, Hindi as a link language, and English as a window to wider opportunities. Students in Hindi-speaking states were expected to learn a language from southern India in place of Hindi, to promote reciprocal cultural exchange.

At the lower secondary stage, all three languages were to be studied: the mother tongue, Hindi or a modern Indian language, and English. At the higher secondary level, any two of these were compulsory. At the university level, no language was to be compulsory.

The formula also encouraged the learning of Sanskrit as an optional subject – considered an essential part of India’s culture and heritage – and supported the development of regional languages to reduce the elitism associated with English-medium instruction.

Why the formula met resistance 🔗

Despite its integrative intent, the three-language formula ran into significant opposition, particularly in southern states. Tamil Nadu was the most vocal in its resistance, viewing the emphasis on Hindi as linguistic imposition by the north on the rest of the country. The three-language policy was not uniformly implemented due to political and regional resistance, and protests in some states were serious enough to force revisions. Over time, several states were permitted to adapt the formula to their own linguistic preferences, which meant that the original vision of reciprocal language learning was never consistently achieved across India.

Critics also argued that the formula placed an unfair burden on students – particularly those in non-Hindi-speaking states – who were effectively required to master a third language while their Hindi-speaking counterparts faced no equivalent challenge. The formula was described in some quarters as a political compromise that no one had truly accepted. It was argued that students would accept the third language as a burden rather than as a meaningful part of their education.

Despite these tensions, the three-language formula remains significant as one of the earliest structured policy attempts to manage India’s linguistic diversity within a national framework. Its core challenge – how to honour regional identity while building national cohesion – continues to shape education debates in India today.

The 6% budget recommendation: a target that remained elusive 🔗

The Kothari Commission recognised clearly that educational reform without adequate funding was unlikely to succeed. It made one of its most consequential – and still frequently cited – recommendations: that education spending should be raised to 6% of national income. The 1968 NPE formally adopted this target.

At the time, India’s public spending on education was well below this level. The 6% target was intended to send a strong signal: that education was not a secondary concern, but a core national investment. Adequate funding was needed to build schools, train teachers, develop curricula, expand access to higher education, and reduce regional disparities in educational infrastructure.

The 6% GDP target for education remained unmet for decades. The 1986 NPE repeated the same goal. So did subsequent policy frameworks. India’s education spending as a share of GDP has historically hovered between 2.5% and 4.5%, with the gap between aspiration and reality reflecting broader constraints: fiscal pressures, competing development priorities, and the sheer scale of the challenge.

The failure to meet this target had real consequences. The 1968 policy lacked implementation mechanisms, making it difficult to track outcomes. Without sufficient funds and accountability structures, many of the policy’s goals – universal enrolment, improved teacher quality, expanded infrastructure – moved slowly. The gap between what the policy promised and what the system delivered became a recurring critique of Indian education planning.

Legacy and lasting impact 🔗

Despite its limitations, the 1968 National Policy on Education was genuinely landmark. It was the first time an attempt was made to give a sense of direction to the country’s entire educational system. It established accountability of the central government for education, laid the groundwork for national standards, and introduced a systematic – if imperfect – approach to planning that all subsequent policies have built upon.

The 10+2+3 structure recommended by the Kothari Commission and enshrined in the 1968 NPE is perhaps the most visible and durable legacy: it structures the schooling and college experience of every Indian student even today. The emphasis on science education directly influenced the expansion of institutions like the IITs. The common school system ideal, though never fully realised, informed the Right to Education Act of 2009, which eventually made free schooling a legal right for children aged 6 to 14.

The Kothari Commission’s recommendations also influenced the 1986 revision of the National Policy on Education, and echoes of its thinking can be found in the National Education Policy 2020 – particularly in its emphasis on equity, multilingualism, vocational integration, and increased public investment. The 1968 NPE set a precedent: that education policy in India must be comprehensive, evidence-based, and oriented toward both social justice and national development.

What the Kothari Commission and the first NPE demonstrated – perhaps more than anything else – is that ambitious reform requires not just vision but sustained political will and financial commitment to translate ideas into outcomes. The 1968 policy got the vision largely right. The harder work of implementation has been an ongoing project ever since.

What do you think? Over five decades after the 1968 NPE set a target of spending 6% of national income on education, India has still not consistently met it – what does this gap between policy ambition and fiscal commitment tell us about how education is prioritised at the national level? And given the continued controversy around the three-language formula, do you think a language policy designed in 1968 can realistically serve the needs of India’s diverse student population today?

References

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kothari_Commission
2. https://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2309546.pdf
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Policy_on_Education
4. https://onlineschoolsindia.in/key-highlights-of-the-national-policy-of-education-1968/
5. https://educerecentre.com/kothari-commission-1964-66/
6. https://theiashub.com/free-resources/post-independence/national-education-policy-1968-education-reforms-india
7. https://www.studocu.com/in/document/university-of-calicut/introduction-to-education/national-policy-of-education-1968/30885257