Private educational books are not growing, thanks to the confusions regarding government policies on education. The directive to CBSE schools to prescribe NCERT books is like a Damocles’ sword hanging on the future of private educational publishing.
Many state governments, such as state boards like West Bengal, Maharashtra and others, are now publishing textbooks for 11th and 12th standards, and are also publishing workbooks to be distributed at much lower prices compared to private publishers. While the quality of content and production leave much to be desired, this has created a dent in the market for the private publishers of educational books.
Government textbook printing, especially at the state government level, is subject to the vagaries of politics. Change of governments, change of syllabus, free distribution, competition with private publishers, changes in tendering system, deciding on the weights of school bags — all these impact on the number of books printed.
It is disappointing to see that there are no modern production methods being introduced into the manufacture of books. The emphasis has been on cost. The production quality of the textbooks, barring a few states, has continuously been on the decline.