India Needs 86.11 Million Higher Education Enrolments by 2035 to Meet NEP 2020 GER Target: Report

The report - “Continuous Improvement Journey of Higher Education Institutions: Approaches and Practices Shaping the Future of Learning” - was jointly released by the Confederation of Indian Industry and Grant Thornton Bharat.

NEP 2020 Target: 50% Gross Enrolment Ratio by 2035.

The ambitious goal of the National Education Policy 2020 is that India’s Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in higher education will rise to 50 per cent by 2035. To make this goal ambitious, India’s HEIs must massively increase both in terms of student enrolment capacity and staff strength.

Traditional brick-and-mortar universities are not prepared to accommodate this kind of expansion, the report said. With a very large student population, a wide range of student services and education needs to be supported by technology to meet this increasing demand. 

Technology-Enabled Learning to Drive Growth.

The report calls for systemic adoption of flexible and technology-enabled learning models that include: 

Digital universities

Virtual learning ecosystems

Credit-based online programmes

Hybrid and blended learning pathways

Such models could be beneficial to increase access off-campus and at low cost while sustaining the quality level, to access. The results are drawn from three targeted roundtables comprising more than 10 universities from northern India and secondary research and field-level discussion with heads of higher education leaders.

Make an Attitude Toward Employability & Skill Evolution

As nearly 40 per cent of core job skills are predicted to evolve by 2030, employability is increasingly at the heart of higher education design in India. 

Institutions are also integrating, more and more:

Micro-credentials

Modular credit systems

Work integrated learning programmes

AI-enabled assessments

Stronger industry partnerships.

The report emphasises that as technology, globalisation, and learner expectations reinvent the education terrain, universities are re-imagining governance structures and academic flexibility, and operational processes.

Both the academic and administrative functions have increasingly been automated and employed using digital tools.

From a Policy Goal to an Operational Demand:

The upgrading of India’s higher education system is no longer just a policy aspiration under NEP 2020—it is operationally essential. The report finds that the focus on expanded access is moving away from access alone to scale, quality and long-term sustainability in higher education growth.