Rs 64.38 crore spent on Pariksha Pe Charcha while NTSE faces cuts: Education ministry data

NEW DELHI: A total of Rs 64.38 crore has been spent on Pariksha Pe Charcha (PPC), prime minister Narendra Modi’s annual interaction with students, since 2020, the education ministry told Lok Sabha on Monday. Last year’s edition cost taxpayers Rs 16.83 crore, significantly less than what the government spent on the National Talent Search Examination and scholarship – Rs 11.5 crore up to March 5, 2025.

The two sets of data were shared by the ministry of education in response to a pointed question from Mala Roy, All India Trinamool Congress’ (AITC) MP from Kolkata Dakshin and Manickam Tagore from Congress, representing Virudhunagar, Tamil Nadu. Careers360 was the first to report on the cost of holding the PPC, organised before the Central Board of Secondary Education’s (CBSE) Classes 10 and 12 board exams each year.

In January 2023, Careers360 reported that each Pariksha Pe Charcha cost more than running a Kendriya Vidyalaya (KV) or a Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya (JNV) for a year. However, the cost rose even further that year but dropped in 2024. The table below shows how much each edition has cost over the past five years.

Pariksha Pe Charcha budget

The PPC 2025 was held on February 10 and for the first time involved celebrities with the programme continuing online for days after the main event with PM Modi.

NTSE expenditure

The other spending details the MPs sought – clearly to highlight the contrast between the BJP-led government’s approach to a single event involving Modi and a scholarship with students as direct beneficiaries – were for the NTSE.

The scholarship scheme is for gifted students and was instituted in 1963. Along with several other scholarships and fellowships whose budgets have declined, the NTSE has seen its allocations fall as well with the current financial year seeing the lowest expenditure in the last four years.

Given below is how much the government has spent on the scholarship scheme over the past few years.

NTSE exam and budget

The written response stated that in 2021 a third-part evaluation report highlighted limitations in design and implementation of the scheme. It said, “The evaluation report and ensuing examination revealed several limitations in scheme design and implementation such as persistent under-representation of rural areas, girls and certain states among scholarship awardees, lack of access to examination centres due to long travel distance, insufficiency of financial assistance, ineffective nurturance and inadequate dissemination of scheme.”

The NTSE scheme and its components are undergoing “comprehensive review” to align with National Education Policy 2020 to address the limitations.