A parliamentary committee report presented to the Lok Sabha has raised serious concerns over acute staffing shortages at two of India’s key school education bodies: the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) and the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).
The committee urged the self-funded body to end its reliance on contractual workers and begin fast-track, time-bound recruitment, reported PTI. To handle daily operations, CBSE currently relies heavily on temporary contractual staff. The parliamentary panel strongly warned against this, cautioning that using temporary personnel for sensitive exam-related tasks poses a serious threat to the safety, quality, and smooth execution of national board exams. The staffing crunch is particularly alarming given CBSE’s massive growth.
NCERT is operating with over half of its sanctioned posts vacant, according to the Tenth Report of the Committee on Estimates (2026-27). As of October 2025, the council had an actual working strength of just 1,248 against a total sanctioned strength of 2,844 positions, leaving 1,596 vacancies. This includes 916 ministerial, 404 ancillary, 145 academic, and 131 school teaching positions. The committee highlighted that such shortages directly impact NCERT’s vital role in implementing the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 and developing new syllabi and national curriculum frameworks, reported PTI. Between 1992-93 and 2024-25, the number of affiliated schools expanded from 3,787 to 31,234, now managed through 25 regional and 5 sub-regional offices. By 2025, candidate figures soared to over 1.70 million for Class XII and 2.38 million for Class X.
