Srinagar, Aug. 11 -- Jammu & Kashmir has witnessed one of the steepest contractions in its government school network in the country, with the number of institutions plunging from 23,173 in 2021-22 to 18,785 in 2023-24, a loss of 4,388 schools in just two years, according to official data tabled in Parliament on Monday.

The figures, sourced from the Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+), show that the decline was particularly sharp between 2021-22 and 2022-23, when the UT lost nearly 4,400 schools in a single year.

This roll-back comes even as the Centre, under the Samagra Shiksha scheme, has been funding the strengthening of school infrastructure, building additional classrooms, and promoting universal access u...