New Delhi: People with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) in India face substantially greater educational disadvantages than those without disabilities, with gender and economic inequalities further widening the gap, according to a study published in Scientific Reports on October 15, 2026.

The research, analysed data from 402,994 adults using the 76th round of the National Sample Survey (NSS), conducted in 2018.

Researchers found that individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities had a 71.3% predicted probability of receiving no formal education. The corresponding probability among people reporting mental illness was 48.3%.

The study also found that individuals with IDD had 28.9 times higher odds of receiving no formal education than those without disabilities. For individuals with mental illness, the odds were 3.3 times higher.

The findings highlight how disability-related barriers can translate into long-term educational exclusion, particularly when combined with poverty and gender discrimination.

Gender and economic inequalities compound exclusion

The researchers examined how educational disadvantages varied across gender and household economic groups.

Women with mental illness faced a particularly pronounced disadvantage. They were 18.7 percentage points more likely than men with mental illness to have received no formal education.

Economic circumstances also influenced educational outcomes. Among individuals with IDD, the predicted probability of receiving no formal education declined from approximately 79.9% in the poorest household group to 62.9% in the richest group.

For individuals with mental illness, the corresponding probability declined from approximately 59.9% to 33.5%.

However, economic advantage did not eliminate gender disparities. The researchers found that women with mental illness continued to experience educational disadvantages even in the wealthiest household category.

The study distinguishes between intellectual and developmental disabilities and mental illness, highlighting the importance of addressing their different educational and support requirements rather than treating them as a single category.

Enrolment figures reveal the scale of the challenge

The research findings gain significance when considered alongside India’s school-enrolment figures.

According to the Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+) data cited in a Lok Sabha response on March 30, 2026, approximately 1.91 million children with special needs were enrolled in government, government-aided and local-body schools during 2024–25.

The corresponding figure was approximately 1.93 million in 2023–24. Girls accounted for 827,521 of the enrolled children in 2024–25, representing approximately 43.4% of the total.

The figures indicate the scale of the population requiring inclusive educational support. However, enrolment alone does not establish whether children are receiving appropriate learning assistance, participating fully in classrooms or progressing through different levels of education.

Representational image.Image credit:Unsplash

Infrastructure and specialist support remain important components of inclusive schooling. The Ministry of Education’s Annual Report 2024–25 recorded that 11.34 lakh schools had ramps, 7.69 lakh had ramps with handrails and 5.06 lakh had children-with-special-needs-friendly toilets during 2023–24.

The government also reported 52,274 government, government-aided and local-body schools with special educators in 2024–25. These figures point to the need to assess not only school access but also the availability and distribution of trained personnel and accessible facilities.

Strengthening inclusive education

India’s Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, and the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, provide the legal framework for improving educational access for children with disabilities.

Under the Samagra Shiksha scheme, the government provides support through early identification, assessment, assistive devices, therapeutic interventions, transport allowances, resource support and individualised learning assistance.

The scheme also provides a stipend of Rs 200 per month for ten months to eligible girls with special needs to encourage school participation.

However, the research highlights the importance of addressing barriers that extend beyond school infrastructure and financial assistance. Teacher preparedness, social stigma, gender discrimination and inadequate access to specialised support can influence educational participation and attainment.

The researchers emphasise the need for gender-sensitive and income-sensitive interventions, including school-based mental-health support, community awareness programmes and stronger access to healthcare services.

The study also acknowledges limitations arising from its reliance on cross-sectional and self-reported data. Its findings establish associations rather than proving that disability alone causes educational exclusion. Moreover, because the analysis covers adults, it cannot directly measure the present-day enrolment or dropout rates of children with disabilities.

Nevertheless, the findings offer an important indication of how educational inequalities can persist into adulthood. They underline the need to strengthen inclusive education systems so that children with disabilities are not merely enrolled in schools but are also supported in completing their education and accessing further opportunities.

Between lectures and coursework in Milton Keynes, Amjad Kabeer spends his free hours doing something far removed from campus life: writing, producing and releasing his own music. Known professionally as Kabeer, the Kerala-born student has spent the past few years building an independent Malayalam hip-hop and R&B career almost entirely on his own terms — one lyric, one beat and one late night at a time.

Two cultures, one sound

For Kabeer, moving from Kerala to the United Kingdom as a student was less an ending to his old life than the start of a search for how to carry it with him. Adjusting to a new country, a new academic routine and a new set of responsibilities was not easy, Kabeer says, but the experience also sharpened his sense of where he came from. Living between two cultures, he says, gave him a different way of thinking about belonging, ambition and personal growth — themes that now run through almost everything he writes.

Rather than treating his Malayalam identity as something to set aside once he moved abroad, Kabeer has placed it at the centre of his music. Language, according to Kabeer, is one of the clearest markers of who a person is, and moving to another country should not mean leaving that part of oneself behind. That conviction shows up directly in his sound: Malayalam lyrics and storytelling set against a contemporary hip-hop and R&B backdrop, built, he says, in the hope that Malayalam music can reach listeners well beyond Kerala or the wider Malayalam-speaking world.

Learning to produce from scratch

The turning point in his development as a producer, Kabeer says, came out of a limitation rather than an opportunity. Professional studio production was out of reach on a student budget, so he decided to learn it himself. Through online tutorials and, by his own account, a great deal of trial and error, he taught himself to produce his own records from scratch. It was a frustrating process, he admits, but it also left him with something he now considers essential to his identity as an artist: creative control over his own work, from a song’s first idea through to its final mix.

“My style is a blend of Malayalam hip-hop, R&B and melodic rap, usually set against atmospheric, moody production”

That control, Kabeer explains, is the real meaning behind his independence — not working alone for its own sake, but being able to turn his own experiences into music without compromising on how they sound. He says he still values collaboration, but being able to carry a track through every stage himself remains central to how he sees himself as an artist.

Six singles, no label

Musically, Kabeer describes his style as a blend of Malayalam hip-hop, R&B and melodic rap, usually set against atmospheric, moody production. His songs return often to self-discovery, relationships, ambition, resilience and the emotional weight of chasing a dream far from home — subjects that, for an artist juggling a degree and a music career at the same time, are not exactly hypothetical. He has released six singles and two music videos so far, entirely through his own resources. Among them, he points to “Clueless” as the one that means the most to him, calling it a marker of how far he has come as both a songwriter and a producer.

Running a music career without a label or management team has not been simple to combine with student life. Kabeer is responsible for every part of the process himself — writing, recording, producing, filming videos, promotion and covering the costs of releasing music — on top of coursework and the everyday demands of living in another country. He describes each release as a chance to grow rather than a burden, for all the pressure involved.

That effort has started to draw outside attention. Kabeer says his music has had airplay on Amazing Radio UK, and his story has been covered by media outlets. For an independent artist working without institutional backing, Kabeer says, that kind of recognition is encouragement to keep going rather than an endpoint in itself.

Representation, one release at a time

Kabeer’s ambitions go beyond individual releases. He wants to help build greater visibility for Malayalam hip-hop within the UK’s wider music scene, and to create more of a creative connection between Kerala and the broader South Asian diaspora. Representation matters to him in particular: growing up, he says, he rarely saw Malayalam hip-hop represented on an international stage, and he hopes his own path encourages other young people from South Asian backgrounds to pursue their creative interests without feeling they have to give up their cultural identity to do it.

Looking ahead, Kabeer plans to keep releasing original music, explore collaborations and look for more opportunities to perform live, with the longer-term goal of building an artistic identity that draws equally on his life in Kerala and in the UK. For a student still early in both his degree and his music career, he puts it simply: the goal was never just to make music while living abroad, but to make something that carries where he is from into whoever he is still becoming.

For a paddy farmer in Kuttanad, the amount of fertiliser needed is different from that recommended for other parts of Kerala. The Kerala Agricultural University recommends 90 kg of nitrogen, 45 kg of phosphorus and 15 kg of potassium per hectare for medium-duration, high-yielding rice varieties in Kuttanad. However, this recommendation applies only under certain conditions. The soil should have medium to high potassium levels, rice straw should be mixed back into the soil, and tidal water should supply some nutrients to the field. If soil tests show low potassium levels, the fertiliser requirement changes.

This is because fertiliser needs depend on several factors, including soil type, water movement, rice variety and how crop residues are managed. If farmers apply more fertiliser than their crops need, cultivation costs can rise. The unused nutrients may also enter nearby water bodies and cause pollution. Fertiliser prices in India are heavily subsidised by the government. In 2024–25, the Centre spent 1.77 lakh crore rupees on fertiliser subsidies. This support keeps fertilisers affordable for farmers, but the cost to the public is rarely included when calculating how profitable farming really is.

A study by Climate Trends, titled The Economics of Cultivation, looks at what happens wchen these government subsidies and the environmental costs of fertiliser use are included in the economics of farming. The study suggests that the actual returns from farming that relies heavily on chemical fertilisers may be considerably lower than they appear when these costs are left out.

What does a Hectare of Wheat Really Earn?

Farmers calculate their profit by private net returns, the money a farmer has left after paying for production. But there is another way called the social net return. This includes the government’s spending on fertiliser subsidies and the greenhouse gas emissions produced during fertiliser manufacturing and use. These costs do not appear in a farmer’s accounts, but are borne by taxpayers and the environment.

Across five wheat cultivation cases examined in the study, the social return was estimated to be 36% to 182% lower than the private return, with an average difference of around 90%. In two cases, the return turned negative after these additional costs were included. Punjab’s wheat cultivation in 2019–20 shows how large this gap can be. The study estimates that farmers earned a net return of 31,901 rupees per hectare after deducting cultivation expenses. However, when an additional 11,554 rupees per hectare in fertiliser subsidy costs and greenhouse gas emissions was accounted for, the return fell to 20,347 rupees per hectare.

The study also estimates that Punjab’s fertiliser-related fiscal cost in 2022–23 was 14,072 rupees per hectare. This was nearly four times the all-India figure of 3,630 rupees per hectare in 2021–22. While the farmers continue to benefit from subsidised fertiliser prices, which reduce their cultivation expenses, the additional costs that are shifted to taxpayers and the environment.

Pricing Policy Influencing Nutrient Choices

India’s fertiliser subsidy policy also influences nutrient use. Introduced in 2010, the Nutrient Based Subsidy (NBS) scheme links subsidies for phosphatic and potassic fertilisers to their nutrient content, while companies have greater freedom to set prices. Urea, which supplies nitrogen, remains under government price control.

This makes urea relatively cheaper and may encourage farmers to use more nitrogen-based fertiliser, even when crops need a different nutrient balance. As the study suggests nitrogen’s share of fertiliser consumption reached 69.9% in 2012–13. Its statistical analysis recorded a 4.42 percentage-point annual increase in the post-2010 trend. However, the analysis covers only four years after the reform and has no control group. It therefore cannot establish that the policy alone caused the increase.

The Indian Council of Agricultural Research recommends soil-test-based fertiliser application rather than a uniform nutrient ratio. Kerala’s lower nitrogen share does not necessarily mean fertiliser use is efficient across all its farms. In Kuttanad, for example, the recommended potassium dose depends on existing soil levels and whether rice straw is incorporated into the field.

Emissions and the Cost of Imported Inputs

Producing synthetic nitrogen fertilisers requires large amounts of energy, much of it from fossil fuels. Their use also releases nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas that traps much more heat than carbon dioxide over 100 years. Climate Trends report finds the global synthetic nitrogen fertiliser supply chain produced an estimated 1.13 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions in 2018, accounting for about 2.1% of global greenhouse gas emissions. In India, fertiliser manufacturing alone produced an estimated 25 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions in 2022–23.

India also depends heavily on imports for fertiliser production. It imports potash, several raw materials used in phosphate fertilisers, natural gas and ammonia. Disruptions to international trade routes and energy supplies can therefore affect both the cost and availability of these inputs. The disruption around the Strait of Hormuz is an example.

When international prices rise, the government may have to spend more to keep fertilisers affordable. Farmers, meanwhile, can face supply shortages and uncertainty over availability, even when retail prices are regulated.
“We need to fundamentally rethink our approach to soil conservation, moving beyond engineering structures and short-term interventions towards the revival of ecosystems. Despite decades of investment, soil erosion continues to intensify, while the productivity of prime agricultural lands and ecosystems is declining.

Restoring soil health, conserving natural resources and strengthening ecological processes must be at the heart of our response. This also calls for promoting diversified cropping practices suited to local agroecological conditions, rather than perpetuating resource-intensive cropping patterns. Building climate-resilient agriculture requires us to address the root causes of soil degradation, strengthen local ecological solutions and restore the natural systems that help communities withstand droughts, floods and other climate stresses.”, said Dr. Basant Kumar Kandpal, Technical Expert (Agriculture and Horticulture), National Rainfed Area
Authority (NRAA).

Can Farmers Move Away From Chemical Inputs?

For Kerala’s rice farmers, fertiliser requirements vary across fields. In Kuttanad, for instance, the recommended potassium dose depends on soil-test results and whether rice straw is returned to the field. Applying these recommendations requires accessible soil testing, regular agricultural extension support and affordable inputs.

“Excessive dependence on chemical fertilisers comes at a far greater cost to the nation than what is reflected in their market prices or subsidy allocations. Soil degradation, environmental damage, energy dependence and the growing fiscal burden are increasingly difficult to ignore. However, the transition to organic and natural farming cannot be left entirely to farmers. It requires sustained government support, investment in research and extension services, affordable alternatives and assured market linkages.”, said Dr Palak Balyan, Lead Author and Research Lead, Climate Trends.

The study calls for changes to fertiliser pricing and subsidy distribution. Its recommendations include pricing urea according to nutrient content, linking part of the subsidy to Soil Health Card advice and supporting farmers who shift to low-input cultivation. It estimates that transitioning one million hectares of transplanted rice to low-input farming could save Rs 1,155 crore annually.

The experiences of Andhra Pradesh and Sikkim show why the transition needs careful planning. Andhra Pradesh’s natural farming programme recorded more than twice the profits at broadly similar yields, while Sikkim faced yield losses amid inadequate farmer training and limited access to certified organic markets.

The challenge, therefore, is to reduce excessive fertiliser use without increasing farmers’ costs or putting yields at risk. The study argues for redirecting public support towards balanced nutrient use, farmer training and affordable alternatives, while accounting for the fiscal, energy and environmental costs of fertiliser-intensive agriculture.