By Dr Gowhar Rashid
When an eminent educationist suggests that teachers are walking away from the classroom, the claim deserves to be taken very seriously.
Krishna Kumar’s recent article in The Indian Express gives voice to anxieties many teachers experience today – administrative overload, data-heavy governance culture, loss of autonomy, and the sense that managerial demands are hollowing out teaching. These concerns are sincere and merit careful engagement. However, the larger conclusion drawn in the article – that teachers in India are leaving the profession because of these anxieties – requires a more careful and evidence-based examination.
The author built his argument around the experiences of three teachers who resigned from the profession. Consider first the resignation of a history teacher. The principal asked her to use technology in the classroom, but she refused. She believes that teaching history calls for analytical reflection on historical data and debates, and this goal cannot be achieved through digital exposure to historical events. Well, the discomfort of integrating technology in the classroom is understandable. Yet, the argument that using technology erodes understanding of history is questionable. Digitized archives, historical maps, oral testimonies, museum collections, and documentary materials expand historical inquiry rather than constrain it. Refusing to use digital resources and using this as a reason to quit the profession is not justified. By the way, staying updated on what is going on in and around education is not a managerial imposition; it is intrinsic to the teaching profession.The second teacher cited in the article resigned from the job because of the burden of so-called non-teaching / extra duties. The author argues that frequent administrative directions to observe various activities, along with the expectation of uploading photographs on social media, have made the teaching profession increasingly stressful. This concern resonates with many educators, but it calls for greater nuance. The Right to Education Act, 2009, clearly states that teachers should not be assigned non-educational duties, except for decennial population census, disaster relief, or election-related work. However, many activities commonly directed by schools and education authorities – such as civic campaigns, cultural observances, field visits, national days, plantation drives, and cleanliness programmes – are not distractions from education; they are an essential part of it. Such activities foster planning, teamwork, civic responsibility, and cultural awareness among students – learning outcomes that classroom instruction alone cannot impart. The concern that carries real weight is expecting teachers to double up as social media managers. This is neither pedagogically sound nor professionally justifiable. The third teacher, in addition to the above concerns, pointed out that rising aggression, bullying, and difficult student behaviour, including extreme instances like bringing knives and firearms in bags, make schools unworkable spaces and the profession of teaching stressful. These concerns need contextual grounding. First, such challenges are not rampant in India as they are in the schools of countries like the US. Second, if anything exists, responding to these socialization failures is not incidental to teaching – it is central to it. Education is not merely the transmission of content; it is the cultivation of conduct, empathy, and resilience. To argue that such challenges justify leaving the profession risks redefining teaching as a task of content delivery that begins only after children are already disciplined. This definition empties education of its social purpose.
If we wish to understand whether teachers are truly walking away from the teaching profession at scale, the most reliable indicator would be the teacher attrition rate. In simple terms, teacher attrition refers to the number of teachers leaving the profession each year. Departure may be due to several personal, professional, and organisational factors such as retirement, ill health, death, family commitment, taking a job in another field, dissatisfaction with working conditions, and other possible reasons. No matter the reason, the significant loss of trained professionals is disruptive for schools, students, and education systems. Unfortunately, India does not have comprehensive and reliable data on teacher attrition. In the absence of such evidence, claims of large-scale exits from the profession remain difficult to substantiate. Moreover, the limited data that is available through proxy indicators like Pupil-Teacher Ratio (PTR), more importantly, the Pupil-Trained Teacher Ratio (PTTR), does not point to an education system haemorrhaging teachers. However, it reveals a different paradox: a surplus of teachers in India by production, yet a shortage of teachers in the classrooms because of uneven deployment across regions, subject specialisations, and stages of schooling.
The real crisis, therefore, is not that teachers are walking away from the classroom. It is that India lacks a robust, integrated teacher workforce data system capable of aligning teacher preparation, recruitment, and deployment in a systematic manner. Without such alignment, the system will continue to experience a surplus of trained teachers on paper and shortages in actual classrooms – with serious implications for public expenditure, educational equity, and teaching quality.
The author holds a Doctorate in Economics of Education from NIEPA and is currently working as a Data Analyst at NCTE. Views expressed are personal, not of the institution he works for.
