"School rationalisation under NEP 2020 risks undermining the Right to Education Act's neighbourhood-school guarantee." Critically examine with reference to recent State-level school closures.

Section 6 of the RTE Act, 2009, read with Article 21-A, obliges the State to establish a school within the notified neighbourhood — 1 km for primary and 3 km for upper primary under the Central RTE Rules [1]. NEP 2020's "school complex" model, clustering a secondary school with feeder schools and anganwadis, seeks resource efficiency [2]. The tension is real but not irreconcilable; the risk lies in execution, not in the idea.

Why rationalisation has merit

• Chronic under-resourcing: over a lakh schools function with a single teacher, making meaningful teaching impossible; pooling staff raises pupil-teacher viability [3].
• Quality focus: NITI Aayog's 2026 report links fragmented, tiny schools to weak learning outcomes and recommends teacher capacity, school leadership and data-driven governance [3].
• Judicial endorsement: the Allahabad High Court dismissed challenges to Uttar Pradesh's pairing of schools with under 50 students, holding it did not violate Article 21-A [4].

Where the risk of undermining RTE arises

• Access: closures concentrate in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh; longer commutes hit rural, tribal and poor households with no transport alternative.
• Gender equity: distance disproportionately depresses girls' attendance and raises safety and dropout risk.
• Statutory dilution by executive order: mergers proceed through State circulars, without amending the Section 6 neighbourhood obligation [1].
• Accountability gap: children dropping off enrolment rolls after mergers are not systematically tracked, and government schools' enrolment share has fallen below half [3].
• Falling public provision: total schools declined from about 11.07 lakh in 2014-15 to roughly 10.13 lakh in 2024-25 [3].

Rationalisation is defensible as a quality intervention but indefensible as a substitute for investment. The way forward is conditional consolidation: no merger without prior transport or residential provision, a mandatory child-tracking audit through UDISE+ [5], and gram sabha consultation before closure. Efficiency and Article 21-A converge only when the school still comes to the child.