BENGALURU: Educationists, professors and other stakeholders unanimously decided to urge the state government to put out the State Education Policy Report in the public domain and to allow discussions among the civil society.
The Karnataka Development Authority (KDA) and Research Institute for Policy Formulation, Karnataka on Saturday held a meeting in Bengaluru to discuss the issue. Educationists said the government must present the report in both Houses of the legislature and adopt it as the official state education policy. As a first step, they urged Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to announce it in his budget speech on March 6.
Kannada Development Authority president Purushothama Bilimale, Fellow and Programme Head of Universalisation of Education at the National Law School of India University VP Niranjanaradhya, and others discussed the crisis in the school education sector in Karnataka because of the absence of a policy.
Niranjaradhya said, “The commission, headed by educationist Sukhadeo Thorat and appointed by the state government, prepared the Karnataka State Education Policy report and submitted it to the government in August 2025. It was expected that this important policy, in line with the aspirations of democracy and Constitution, would be released in the public domain.
This is because students, teachers, parents, education experts and others have the right to know the intentions, proposals and recommendations of the policy.
It is an indispensable duty of political morality that an education policy should not be a report of just a few experts but should become a part of the thinking of the country and that everyone’s opinions should guide the implementation of the policy.”
Niranjaradhya said, “We demand that the State to present the SEP report in the public domain and allow for discussion among the civil society. It is very important to formulate a consensus opinion of everyone through public debate, dialogue, criticism and formulate measures.
We need to be careful not to repeat hasty, unilateral decisions, unconstitutional and directives as happened during the implementation of the National Education Policy (2020).”