Teacher Recruitment: As per the data shared by the Education Ministry of India in response to a question in parliament on December 4, there are currently over 8.4 lakh teacher vacancies in government schools at the elementary and secondary levels. This includes 7.2 lakh vacancies at the primary level and 1.2 lakh vacancies at the secondary level. Compared to the previous data shared by the ministry in March, this is a slight improvement from the Parliament Standing Committee's report which flagged a total of 9.8 lakh teaching vacancies in government schools, including 7.4 lakh vacancies at the elementary level (Classes 1 to 8) and 1.6 lakh vacancies at the secondary level (Classes 9 and 10).
More than half of the vacancies are vacant in three states of India including Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Jharkhand at primary and secondary levels of government schools. According to the data, 1,92,097 primary teacher vacancies are available in Bihar, 1,43,564 are in Uttar Pradesh, 75, 726 are in Jharkhand, 53, 137 are in West Bengal, and 52, 394 are in Madhya Pradesh. On the other side, Bihar has a total of 32,929 vacancies available for secondary school teachers, Jharkhand has 21, 717 vacancies for secondary school level teachers, Madhya Pradesh has 15,145 vacancies, Uttar Pradesh has 7, 492 and West Bengal has 7, 378 vacancies.
Earlier, the Bihar government had conducted a large-scale teacher recruitment drive in October. A total of 1,21,370 vacancies are being filled for school teacher posts. Initially, the government notified only 69,706 vacancies which were exceeded by adding 50,000 vacancies.
Zero vacancies in Maharashtra, Odisha and other states
According to the report, Maharashtra, Odisha, Goa, Kerala, Maharashtra, Meghalaya, and Nagaland have zero vacancies at the primary level. Similarly, Kerala, Maharashtra, Nagaland, Odisha and Sikkim have also reported zero vacancies at the secondary level in government schools.
