MAINS Current Affairs includes India’s Literacy Leap: Journey Towards Viksit Bharat & Rise in Cybercrimes in India

Social Issues; Education

1. India’s Literacy Leap: Journey Towards Viksit Bharat

Context: India’s progress in literacy, with the PLFS 2025 reporting an overall literacy rate of 81.1%, while stressing persistent rural, gender and educational-stage gaps.

About Literacy

• The Department of School Education and Literacy defines literacy as the ability to read, write and compute with comprehension, including the ability to identify, understand, interpret and create, along with digital and financial literacy.
  • A State/UT attaining 95% literacy is considered fully literate.
• According to Census 2011, literacy is an ability to read and write with understanding in any language for individuals aged 7 years and above.
• According to UNESCO, literacy is the ability to read, write, use numbers and digital materials to solve problems and participate in work, learning and everyday life.
  • Thus, literacy is increasingly a foundation for inclusion, equality and human development.

India’s Literacy Progress

• India has witnessed a major transformation:
  • Overall literacy increased from 32% in 1951 to 74.04% in 2011.
  • Male literacy rose from 15% to 82.14%, while female literacy increased from 8.86% to 65.46%.
  • Urban literacy increased from 59% to 84.1%, while rural literacy rose from 12.10% to 67.8%.
  • Between 2001–11, rural female literacy grew by 26%, compared with 10% among rural males.
  • PLFS 2025 places overall literacy at 1%. Among persons aged 7 years and above, urban literacy was 89% and rural literacy 77.4%; rural female literacy stood at only 70.3%.

School Education: Access, Retention and Learning

• Literacy gains depend upon children entering, staying within and progressing through school.
• According to UDISE+ 2025-26:
  • 72 crore students were enrolled in schools.
  • GER: 8% Foundational, 91.7% Preparatory, 89.6% Middle and 71.7% Secondary.
  • Dropout rates rise across stages, from 1.8% at Preparatory to 7% at Secondary.
  • Retention falls from 98.5% at Foundational to 51.9% at Secondary.
  • Transition rates are 99.2% Foundational–Preparatory, 93.8% Preparatory–Middle and 88.3% Middle–Secondary.
• Thus, secondary-level retention and learning continuity remain important concerns.

Higher Education and Human Capital

• Higher education participation has expanded:
  • Enrolment increased from 3.42 crore in 2014-15 to 50 crore in 2023-24.
  • GER increased from 23.7% to 30% over the same period.
  • Higher education out-turn increased from 88.28 lakh in 2014-15 to over 09 crore in 2023-24.
• This expansion, including greater participation of women and disadvantaged groups, supports human-capital formation and the NEP 2020 target of 50% higher-education GER by 2035.

Key Issues & Concerns in India’s Literacy

• Rural–urban Divide: PLFS 2025 shows a 11.6 percentage-point gap in literacy between rural and urban populations aged 7+.
• Gender Disparity: Rural female literacy remains significantly below male literacy.
• Secondary-stage Attrition: Dropout and declining retention become pronounced at higher school stages.
• Beyond Basic Literacy: Digital, financial, numeracy and critical life skills are increasingly essential.
• Equity & Inclusion: Regional and social disparities require sustained attention.
• Learning Quality: Enrolment alone needs to translate into foundational competencies and meaningful learning.

Government Initiatives

• ULLAS (New India Literacy Programme): It targets adults aged 15+ who missed formal schooling.
  • It combines functional literacy, numeracy, critical life skills and lifelong learning through a hybrid model.
  • It aims to cover 5 crore learners (2022–27) with an outlay of ₹1,037.90 crore.
  • About 03 crore learners and 52.20 lakh volunteers have registered, while over 3.3 crore have participated in FLNAT so far.
  • Ten (10) States/UTs have declared themselves fully literate between 2024 and 2026. These include Ladakh, Mizoram, Goa, Tripura, Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Sikkim, Uttarakhand and Jammu & Kashmir.
• NIPUN Bharat (2021): It seeks universal foundational literacy and numeracy by 2026-27, ensuring foundational skills by Grade 2 for children aged 3–8 years.
• Other Supporting Schemes:
  • Samagra Shiksha: Inclusive schooling, foundational learning, teacher development and vocational integration.
  • PM SHRI: Strengthening 14,500+ exemplar schools.
  • PM e-VIDYA: Multimodal digital, online and on-air learning, expected to benefit nearly 25 crore children.
  • PM POSHAN: Hot cooked meals for 20 crore students in 10.36 lakh schools, supporting nutrition and school participation.

Literacy and Viksit Bharat

• Literacy contributes to women’s empowerment, social inclusion, employability, productivity, innovation and economic participation.
• It is central to UN SDG 4, which seeks inclusive and equitable quality education and lifelong learning.

Way Forward

• India’s challenge is shifting from literacy access to literacy quality. Priorities should include:
  • Bridging rural-urban and gender disparities;
  • Strengthening foundational learning;
  • Reducing secondary-stage dropouts;
  • Expanding digital and financial literacy;
  • Improving teacher capacity and learning outcomes;
  • Linking education with employable and future-ready skills;
  • Sustaining community participation in adult literacy;

Cybersecurity

2. Rise in Cybercrimes in India

Context

• As per the NCRB Crime in India 2024 Report, the overall crime rate in India declined by 6% in 2024 compared with 2023 but there was an increase of over 17% in cybercrime cases.

About Cybercrime

• Cybercrime refers to criminal activities that involve the use of computers, networks, and digital technologies. 
  • It encompasses a wide range of illicit activities conducted in the virtual space, often with the intent to compromise, damage, or gain unauthorized access to computer systems, networks, and data.
  • Cybercriminals employ various techniques and tools to exploit vulnerabilities in networks, and they may target individuals, organizations, or even governments.
• Nature of Cybercrimes: 
  • Frequently receiving calls about deliveries they never ordered, high-return investment scam calls, bank officials asking for personal account details, and calls about their phones being linked to illegal activities or an unknown number claiming to be their friend urgently in need of money.
  • Calls from police or someone in authority claiming that their friend or relative is in danger or has committed some type of crime.
• Modus Operandi: 
  • Instead of relying solely on technical expertise, fraudsters target social relationships and institutional credibility. 
  • Investment scams appeal to the aspiration of getting rich quickly, delivery scams draw on trust in e-commerce, bank impersonation uses institutional credibility, and fake police calls exploit fear of authority.

Impact of Cyber Crimes

• National Security Threats: Cyber crimes pose a threat to national security when state-sponsored actors or criminal organizations target critical infrastructure, government institutions, or military systems.
• Data Breaches: Data breaches lead to the exposure of personal information, trade secrets, intellectual property, and other confidential data, causing severe damage to the affected entities.
• Financial Losses: Cyber fraud, ransomware, phishing and online scams can cause substantial financial losses to individuals, banks, businesses and governments.
• Disruption of Services: Cyber attacks disrupt essential services such as power grids, communication networks, and transportation systems.
• Erosion of Trust: Repeated cyber fraud and data breaches reduce public confidence in digital payments, e-governance, online banking and other digital services.

Main Challenges in Tackling the Scams

• High-Tech Tools: Use of deepfakes, number spoofing, encrypted messaging, and dark web data leaks makes attribution difficult.
• Psychological Pressure: Fraudsters exploit fear, urgency, and authority figures, especially targeting senior citizens.
• Instant Payment Rails: Rapid money transfers via UPI and online banking allow scammers to siphon funds before accounts can be frozen.
• Enforcement & Reporting Barriers: Delayed victim reporting due to fear or embarrassment, combined with cross-border legal challenges.

Initiatives by Government of India to Prevent Cybercrimes

• Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In): CERT-In is the national nodal agency for responding to cybersecurity incidents.
  • It provides proactive and reactive cybersecurity support and plays a crucial role in ensuring the security and resilience of the country’s cyber infrastructure.
• National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre (NCIIPC): NCIIPC is responsible for protecting critical information infrastructure from cyber threats.
  • It identifies and designates critical sectors and advises organizations in these sectors on enhancing their cybersecurity measures.
• Cyber Crime Prevention against Women & Children (CCPWC) scheme: The Ministry of Home Affairs has provided financial assistance to all the States & UTs under the scheme to support their efforts for setting up of cyber forensic-cum-training laboratories, training, and hiring of junior cyber consultants.
• Public Awareness: Regular alerts distributed through SMS, railway/airport displays, and the CyberDost initiative.
• Anti-Spoofing Systems: DoT measures to identify and block incoming international calls disguised as domestic Indian numbers.
• Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C): It provides a framework and ecosystem for Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) to deal with cyber crimes in a comprehensive and coordinated manner.
  • ‘Joint Cyber Coordination Teams’ have been constituted for seven regions at Mewat, Jamtara, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Visakhapatnam and Guwahati under the I4C.
• National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal: It is launched to enable the public to report incidents pertaining to all types of cyber crimes.
  • A toll-free number 1930 has been operationalized to get assistance in lodging online cyber complaints.
  • The Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System module has also been launched for immediate reporting of financial frauds and to stop siphoning off funds by the fraudsters.
• Cyber Swachhta Kendra (Botnet Cleaning and Malware Analysis Centre): This initiative is aimed at creating awareness about botnet and malware infections and providing tools for detection and cleaning.
  • It also provides cyber security tips and best practices for citizens and organisations

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