NEP 2020: Vision Without Velocity

When the National Education Policy (NEP) was unveiled in 2020, it felt less like policy and more like a manifesto of hope. A comprehensive, flexible, research-driven higher education system was finally on the cards. For a country that had waited over three decades for such a promise, reimagining education for a new century was no longer impossible. And yet, five years later, one cannot help but ask: is that hope still alive, or has the promise, once inspiring, begun to wither under the weight of its own ambition and started to fade under the pressure of its own high expectations?

Well, to be fair, not everything has been left untouched. The Academic Bank of Credits (ABC) system is up and running, though with a modest number of takers. The four-year undergraduate degree has found a place in several universities. Multiple entry and exit flexibilities are in circulation, and platforms like DigiLocker, the National Academic Depository (NAD), and the National Digital Education Architecture (NDEAR) represent early and continuing efforts towards a digital education ecosystem envisioned by policy. Progress? Certainly. But pace? That’s where the policy stumbles.

Yet, except for these initial moves, the broader architecture of reform remains fragile and still a distant dream. Consider the much-celebrated multidisciplinary university model. By now, undergraduate education was meant to be a seamless interplay of sciences, arts, and vocational studies. By 2024-25, this was supposed to be the new norm. But what’s the ground reality? Most varsities, already stretched thin with faculty shortages and inadequate infrastructure, are struggling even to sustain their existing disciplines and keeping the programmes afloat. Expecting them to reimagine education without the scaffolding of trained staff, revised curricula, institutional support, and a cultural shift in pedagogy is like asking a brick kiln to produce crystal.

Similarly, the four-year undergraduate structure, which was to be mainstreamed in central universities by 2022 and widely adopted by 2025, is largely a cut-paste of the old three-year framework, with little pedagogic innovation. Multiple entry-exit routes? Officially enabled, but in practice, they remain a puzzle for students and a checkbox for institutions.

And then there is the Higher Education Commission of India (HECI)—a visionary move to collapse the overlapping mandates of UGC, AICTE and others into one coherent regulatory body. Deadline? 2030. Progress? Almost none. Regulatory fragmentation persists, ensuring that compliance remains the preoccupation while creativity takes a back seat.

Perhaps, the most ambitious of NEP’s targets is the goal of achieving a 50% Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) by 2035, a sharp leap from the current 28.4%. Ambitious? Certainly. Achievable? Possibly, but only with an explicit strategy, serious investments, and a clear roadmap. As of today, there is a very little visibility on how such a sharp leap will be achieved in just over a decade, when even the fundamentals remain half-baked.

The National Research Foundation (NRF) was another centrepiece of the policy, aimed at reviving India’s feeble research output. With a target year of 2030, there is still time, but as of today, its progress has been sluggish. The country’s universities continue to languish in global rankings, largely because the ecosystem for serious and sustained research remains underdeveloped, lacking both funding and academic freedom. Nonetheless, the NRF has the potential to become a game-changer, but only if it is rescued from bureaucratic delays and supported by genuine academic leadership.

The policy’s call for a Digital University and expansion of online learning seemed perfectly timed. The Covid-19 pandemic too served as a pilot, yet the outcomes remain mixed. The digital divide persists, with technology reaching cities while rural areas continue to struggle, both in terms of access and infrastructure. This highlights the fact that without fair access to devices, reliable internet, digital literacy, and, most importantly, adequate training for faculty in online pedagogy, the promise of digital and online education risks becoming yet another source of exclusion.

The call for promotion of regional languages in higher education to enhance linguistic diversity, remains mostly aspirational. Resources? Lacking. Faculty expertise? Hard to find. While the intent is clear, the execution remains muddled and threatens academic standards, putting students on an uneven play field in global contexts.

It is important to acknowledge that some of NEP’s targets stretch into 2030 and beyond, but should that comfort us? Well, the concern is not merely about time; it is about momentum. Five years on, we are yet to see a coherent and coordinated push to implement reforms at scale. States have been left to figure it out themselves, leading to patchy outcomes. There is no central accountability mechanism, no public dashboard to track milestones, and, worryingly, no transparent appraisal of what is working and what is not.

We must remind ourselves that NEP 2020 is not a ceremonial document, it is a national commitment. It captures the aspirations of a nation eager to transform its education system. Well, aspirations are important, but without adequate resources, political will, and unrelenting follow-through, even the finest visions evaporate into policy fatigue.

We cannot afford to let NEP 2020 become another policy that flattered to deceive, well-articulated, widely praised, and poorly delivered. If the phenomenal white paper is to be anything more than a glossy brochure, it must transition from idea to action. Not tomorrow. Now! The real test of the policy is not in its text but in its pragmatic application. As we are already into mid-2020s, the time for visioning is over. What we need now is relentless, grounded action, across states, universities, and ministries, anchored in transparency and a sincere commitment to our students’ futures.

If we fail here, it will not just be a policy’s failure, it will be a betrayal of a generation that was promised a new dawn but left in the shadows of the old order.

Adil Bashir, Higher Education Policy Advisor and Digital Pedagogy Expert