It pained her to see former students helping their parents sell vegetables on the streets near Jivraj Mehta Hospital in the evenings. These 57 children dropped out from classes 1-8 from her school during the 2025-26 academic session. At the end of the ‘Back to School’ campaign launched by the State Education Department in May-June 2026, all the children returned to school.
“Apart from selling vegetables, children would go to the wholesale market with their parents in the morning to buy them. So, they would miss both the morning as well as the evening classes,” Bhadresha tells The Indian Express. “While children were ready to attend school, it was the parents who were insisting that they help them in their work.”
Bhadresha heads Vasna Municipal Primary School Number 3. A veteran, she had spent 12 years at a municipal school in Kankaria before she joined here 18 months ago. The school runs a morning shift for classes 1-5 and evening for classes 6-8.
The government had identified over 6.41 lakh students who had dropped out in the past academic year, across 44,000 government and grant-in-aid schools in Gujarat, and launched a campaign to re-enroll them. In Ahmedabad, after the teachers’ dogged tracking of school dropouts, 9,036 from 10,387 enrolled back — recording an 86% success rate for the drive. The number includes 1,357 former students who had enrolled in schools in other states or in Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) and continued their education.
Every teacher faced a different obstacle. In the case of Suketubhai Yagnik, teacher at Jahangirpura Primary School in Asarwa area, over 80% of his 37 students were girls who dropped out. When he visited homes of the six girl students who had dropped out of Class 8, their parents told him they needed the elder daughter to take care of younger siblings or do chores around the house.
“Parents are of the opinion that after a certain age, girls should not go out and study. Instead, they train them in household work such as stocking water, cutting vegetables, cooking, cleaning and washing. They even teach a 6-7 year old girl all these tasks,” Yagnik says, adding, “When everything else would fail, at that point we would make parents aware about government schemes, especially for girls. Yet parents cited social constraints and would refuse to send them back.”
For Yagnik and other teachers, the task grew difficult as the families were vegetable vendors or daily wagers living in rented quarters or temporary structures. “We would find them the first time, but they would be gone in the second. The contact number and addresses submitted during the admission process became irrelevant. Every 3-4 months, they would keep changing their numbers as most of the time they do not recharge their mobile numbers,” says Yagnik.
Sanjay Raval, principal of Chanakya Gujarati Primary school in Chanakyapuri, says, “Migration is a big issue among parents in our school. A majority of them are from Rajasthan and a few from different districts of Gujarat. Around 80% of them are into footwear-making work, while those from Gujarat are mainly safai kamdars.” It is one of the seven schools in Ahmedabad city that also has a secondary school launched last year. Of 54 students re-enrolled under Raval, seven who had dropped out after Class 8 were readmitted in Class 11.
Ahmedabad Municipal School Board Administrative Officer L D Desai said, “Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel felicitated our teachers on July 22 for achieving a high success rate in bringing back the dropped out students.”
Ritu Sharma is an Assistant Editor with The Indian Express' Gujarat bureau, an editorial position that reflects her experience and Authority in regional journalism. With over a decade of concentrated reporting experience, she is a highly Trustworthy and specialized journalist, especially noted for her Expertise in the education sector across Gujarat and previously Chandigarh. Expertise Primary Authority (Education): With over ten years of dedicated reporting on education in both Gujarat and Chandigarh, Ritu Sharma is a foremost authority on educational policy, institutional governance, and ground realities from "KG to PG." Her coverage includes: Higher Education: In-depth scrutiny of top institutions like IIM-Ahmedabad (controversies over demolition/restoration of heritage architecture), IIT-Bombay (caste discrimination issues), and new initiatives like international branch campuses in GIFT City. Schooling & Policy: Detailed coverage of government schemes (Gyan Sadhana School Voucher Scheme), the implementation and impact of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, teacher recruitment issues, and the impact of national policies like the NEP. Student Welfare: Reporting on critical issues such as suicide allegations due to caste discrimination, and the challenges faced by students (e.g., non-delivery of NAMO tablets). ... Read More
