PARAKH Rashtriya Sarvekshan (PRS) 2024: The New Baseline for Competency-Based Learning
PARAKH’s PRS 2024 was India’s largest-ever, competency-based system-level assessment conducted with the explicit objective of measuring stage-wise learning outcomes mapped to the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. The survey covered the Foundational, Preparatory and Middle stages by assessing students in Grades 3, 6 and 9 across language, mathematics, science and social sciences, and paired student assessments with rich contextual instruments like teacher & school questionnaires, classroom and school observations, etc.
PRS 2024 sampled 21,15,022 children from 74,229 schools across 781 districts in all States and Union Territories with over 2.7 lakh teachers, making its scope both deep and nationally representative[1]. Its core objective was not merely to measure learning levels but to establish a national baseline for competency-based learning and the application of 21st-century skills. Methodologically, PRS 2024 combined competency-based assessment design with rigorous sampling, standardised administration and multilevel data collection. The Programme’s operational manual specifies stage-wise assessment blueprints aligned with PARAKH’s competency frameworks, stratified sampling to ensure representativeness across state, management type, and rural/urban strata, and trained enumerators using standardised protocols and secure OMR/digital capture.
The headline data contains nuanced patterns that illuminate both progress and persistent challenges. Nationally, PRS reported higher average scores in language than in mathematics at the Foundational stage (Class 3), which suggests that while emergent literacy is strengthening in many contexts, early numeracy remains fragile. Girls outperformed boys in language, while gender parity was closer in mathematics. Class-wise participation was extensive: almost 6.0 lakh Class 3 students and 6.63 lakh Class 6 students were assessed, enabling robust subnational disaggregation. Several states, including Punjab, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Rajasthan and Maharashtra, in various domains, emerged as top performers on selected competencies; strikingly, some states reported rural students outperforming urban peers in language and mathematics, a pattern that complicates conventional urban-advantage assumptions and points to the importance of local pedagogical and community factors.
PRS’s focus on Foundational Literacy and Numeracy reveals a strong national average in Recognition and Recall skills. However, the critical talking point emerged from the sharp decline in performance when students were assessed on Applied Numeracy and Critical Comprehension. For instance, while over 75% of students could solve direct calculation problems, less than 40% could solve a two-step word problem requiring the application of that same arithmetic skill in a novel context. This finding systematically validated the need for NIPUN Bharat Mission.
For Class 6 (Preparatory stage), the assessment of language, mathematics and science reveals widening divergence in higher-order tasks. Item-level diagnostics show concentrated weakness in tasks requiring reasoning across domains, signalling the need for pedagogies that explicitly scaffold transfer and metacognition. PARAKH’s reporting disaggregates performance by cognitive demand, showing that average scores fall as tasks demand more reasoning and application, a core inference for improving instruction.
In Mathematics, for example, the data showed that a majority of students mastered ‘Level 1: Calculation’ and ‘Level 2: Procedural Fluency,’ but the sharp drop-off occurred at ‘Level 3: Contextual Application and Modelling,’ indicating that students can do the math but struggle to use it. This highlighted a widening ‘conceptual gap’ as students transitioned into middle school. Performance in procedural knowledge remained adequate, but scores plummeted when competencies required abstract thinking, systematic inquiry, or the application of scientific principles. The derivation here was clear: the system successfully transmits declarative knowledge. Still, it fundamentally fails to foster the higher-order skills necessary for successful progression into the secondary and senior secondary stages.
State-wise and competency-wise results follow a pattern of heterogeneity, both between and within states. Some high-performing states display consistent strengths across stages and domains; others show domain-specific strengths. Disaggregation by management type and locale further reveals that private and central schools generally maintain higher averages, but that pockets of excellence in public outperform expectations. Competency-wise, comprehension and conceptual reasoning are the two areas that most states flagged as needing targeted intervention, while procedural fluency and curriculum coverage are comparatively better in many contexts.
A strong correlation between student performance and indicators can be drawn from the TQ/SQ data, such as the teacher-student ratio, the percentage of teachers with competency-based assessment training, and the availability of digital infrastructure. States like Kerala, Himachal Pradesh, and certain Union Territories consistently showed performance significantly above the national median, particularly in the complex Problem-Solving and Creative Thinking competencies. Conversely, several large Northern states, despite having a majority of the student population, registered performance clusters well below the national average, especially in the competency cluster of Scientific Reasoning.
From PRS 2024, several positives emerge. First, the sheer scale and methodological rigour of the exercise give the system a credible baseline mapped to NEP’s stage framework, a prerequisite for any large-scale reform. Second, the survey documents growing adoption of progressive pedagogical practices: high percentages of teachers reported using experiential learning, competency-based assessments, arts and sports integration and project work, indicating system readiness for NEP-aligned pedagogies. Third, the presence of district-level variation, including rural districts outperforming urban ones, suggests that effective local practices can be identified and scaled. These strengths imply that PARAKH’s data provides a powerful lever for policy and practice. The PRS successfully institutionalised a competency-first mindset, providing a definitive national measure that educators can no longer ignore in favour of traditional mark sheets. The integration of contextual data with psychometrics makes it a sophisticated diagnostic tool that can attribute performance variance to systemic variables. The inherent alignment of the PRS framework with PISA standards provides India with an international benchmarking capability, ensuring that domestic reforms are globally relevant and future-ready.
However, PRS 2024 also surfaces Equity gaps as disadvantaged socio-economic groups and certain marginalised geographies continue to lag. Teacher capacity varies widely, while many report adopting progressive methods, the depth, frequency and quality of such practices differ considerably. Portfolio-based assessment and systematic formative assessment are underutilised in many schools. Infrastructure and digital access disparities still constrain remedial and enrichment opportunities, and the translation from diagnostic results to sustained classroom change remains uneven across states and districts. The most prominent negative was the immediate political and public misinterpretation of the results; since the assessment bar was significantly higher, initial scores appeared lower than those from previous NAS cycles, leading to the “Performance Dip” fallacy and a potentially negative perception of the NEP 2020 reforms.
To convert PRS findings into measurable improvement, a multi-pronged strategy is needed. State and district Annual Work Plans and budgets must be aligned with PARAKH diagnostics. Practical, low-cost pedagogical interventions proven to build reasoning must be scaled and integrated into teacher continuous professional development (CPD) and NISHTHA modules. Frequent low-stakes formative checks in schools that mirror PARAKH’s competency structure must be done so that teachers can track progress and adapt instruction in real time. Data-to-action systems at district levels via dashboards, teacher coaching loops, subject-wise intervention handbooks and community engagement must be promoted to sustain accountability.
Equity must be made non-negotiable by resourcing targeted interventions for lagging subgroups. Investments in research-practice partnerships to pilot and evaluate scalable instructional models must be actively promoted. Central and state governments must use the PRS data to prioritise infrastructure upgrades, teacher deployment, and the provision of high-quality learning materials to the lowest-performing districts and schools identified by the data. PARAKH should rapidly disseminate digital learning objects and pedagogical guides via platforms like DIKSHA, which are precisely mapped to the competencies where students struggled the most, ensuring that teachers have immediate, high-quality resources to adjust their classroom practice in real-time.
In conclusion, PRS 2024 offers a granular, actionable national baseline for India’s transition to competency-based education under NEP. If states convert diagnostics into sustained teacher capacity development, curricular alignment, and equitable resource targeting, PRS can move from a snapshot to a sustained instrument of improvement. States like Gujarat, Odisha, and Meghalaya have already used PRS findings to redesign their teacher training and foundational learning programs. The PRS model is also being linked with NIPUN Bharat to track foundational literacy outcomes more effectively. By fostering a culture of continuous diagnosis, accountability, and pedagogical innovation, the PRS 2024 can become the catalyst for the transformative goals of the NEP 2020.
