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Social Divisions in School Participation and Attainment in India: 1983-2004

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  • M. Niaz Asadullah
  • Uma Kambhampati
  • Florencia Lopez Boo

Abstract

This study documents the size and nature of “boy-girl” and “Hindu-Muslim” gaps in children’s school participation and attainments in India. Individual-level data from two successive rounds of the National Sample Survey suggest that considerable progress has been made in decreasing the Hindu-Muslim gap. Nonetheless, the gap remains sizable even after controlling for numerous socioeconomic and parental covariates, and the Muslim educational disadvantage in India today is greater than that experienced by girls and Scheduled Caste Hindu children. A gender gap still appears within as well as between communities, though it is smaller within Muslim communities. While differences in gender and other demographic and socio-economic covariates have recently become more important in explaining the Hindu-Muslim gap, those differences altogether explain only 25 percent to 45 percent of the observed schooling gap.

Suggested Citation

  • M. Niaz Asadullah & Uma Kambhampati & Florencia Lopez Boo, 2009. "Social Divisions in School Participation and Attainment in India: 1983-2004," Research Department Publications 4637, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    • Handle: RePEc:idb:wpaper:4637
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    Cited by:

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    3. Mohanty, Smrutirekha, 2021. "A distributional analysis of the gender wage gap among technical degree and diploma holders in urban India," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    4. Rashmi Rashmi & Bijay Kumar Malik & Sanjay K. Mohanty & Udaya Shankar Mishra & S. V. Subramanian, 2022. "Predictors of the gender gap in household educational spending among school and college-going children in India," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-11, December.
    5. R Vaidehi & A Bheemeshwar Reddy & Sudatta Banerjee, 2021. "Explaining Caste-based Digital Divide in India," Papers 2106.15917, arXiv.org.
    6. Escobal, Javier & Flores, Eva, 2009. "Maternal Migration and Child Well-Being in Peru," MPRA Paper 56463, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Varughese, Aswathy Rachel & Bairagya, Indrajit, 2020. "Group-based educational inequalities in India: Have major education policy interventions been effective?," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    8. Javier Escobal & Eva Flores, 2009. "Maternal Migration and Child Well-being in Peru(Migración materna y bienestar infantil en el Perú)," Documentos de Trabajo (Niños del Milenio-GRADE) ninosm56, Niños del Milenio (Young Lives).
    9. Reddy, A. Bheemeshwar, 2015. "Changes in Intergenerational Occupational Mobility in India: Evidence from National Sample Surveys, 1983–2012," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 329-343.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    gender inequality; India; religion; social disparity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • Z12 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Religion

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