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Leena Bhattacharya, Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research (IGIDR)
The Right to Education (RTE) Act of 2009 made elementary education free and compulsory for children aged 6-14 years in India. We argue that although RTE was universal by design, free and compulsory education in Government schools would increase attendance of children from rural low-income families the most. We use four rounds of nationally representative data spanning 1999-2000 to 2017-2018. We estimate a triple differences model to examine the changes in school attendance of children from rural low-income families (measured by bottom-two monthly per capita consumption expenditure quintiles) relative to children from rural high-income families (measured by topmost monthly per capita consumption expenditure quintile) in the post-reform era. Our finding confirms the initial hypothesis that attendance of boys (girls) from rural low-income families increased by 4 (5) per cent in the post-reform era compared to children from rural high income families, who would have had finances to attend schools even earlier. Sub-group analysis shows that the increase in attendance was mainly driven by girls and by children in upper primary grades in the post reform era. We check for differential impact on children in the urban sector as well. Our hypothesis remains robust to alternate specification of treatment and control groups.
Keywords: Children and youth, Policy evaluation, Outcome and impact evaluations
Presented in Session 13. Enabling Children and Adolescents to Realize their Full Potential: What Works and What Does Not?