Bengaluru: Student enrolment in govt schools across the state has steadily declined in the post-Covid years, data tabled in the legislative council shows.

Statistics from the department of school education and literacy Monday revealed that admissions in state-run primary and high schools have dropped considerably over the past three academic years.

Referring to the data, ML Anil Kumar of Congress said student enrolment had fallen by 4.7 lakh. “While student enrolment during 2022-23 was at 45.4 lakh, it reduced to 42.9 lakh. The same numbers during 2024-25 plummeted to 40.7 lakh,” Kumar said.

School education and literacy minister Madhu Bangarappa told the House the govt was aware of the problem and was taking steps to reverse the trend.

“One of the major issues that affects enrolment is the absence of pre-primary sections in govt schools,” Bangarappa said. “We have now started about 5,000 LKG-UKG classes besides introducing bilingual education. We are hopeful that these measures will help draw more students to govt schools.”

Bangarappa said Karnataka Public Schools — which provide continuous schooling from kindergarten to pre-university — were intended to boost enrolments. “The govt has been setting up these schools in rural areas on priority,” he said.

Official data tabled during the discussion revealed several proposals to close state-run high schools. However, Bangarappa insisted that the govt will not shut any school due to poor enrolment.

“We have received proposals to shut schools with very low student strength. But we have not closed a single primary school on grounds of poor admissions. I assure the House that we will not close any such schools in the future either,” he said.

However, contradicting the minister’s remarks, a high school at Hulikal, Tumakuru district, was shut down in 2023-24 due to inadequate student numbers.

Bangarappa also said the govt will complete recruitment of teachers in Kalyana Karnataka region within four months of publication of internal reservation quota. Replying to a calling attention by BJP’s CT Ravi in the legislative council, Bangarappa said there are 16,577 teacher posts vacant in govt primary schools in the Kalyana Karnataka and more than 33,527 vacancies in other parts of the state. The govt had authorised filling of 4,882 posts, but the process was suspended due to pending internal reservation issues.