According to the UNICEF India report 2020, interrupted learning impacted 286 million children, with school dropout rates skyrocketing due to covid (India U, 2021). More alarming is the data from the year 2000, estimating 18 million street children in India, which was the highest in the world (Bellamy, 2000). 23 years hence and post pandemic, this number is inevitably much larger, and reaches 7%of all the child population of the world[1]. The large number is due to unemployment, rapid urbanization, large population, extreme poverty, increasing disparities in wealth, cutbacks in government social and educational budgets and child abuse (Bartlett, 1999). We found that the magnitude of the population of children who fall into the category of juvenile street children remains nebulous at best with no official data available. This has led to paper policies that have no role in reality and stay as lip service at best. With limited knowledge of the numbers, there is an inherent impediment to making action plans and budget outlays. The objective of this paper is to study the data available regarding the education of street children, identify the legal framework available to them in India and prepare a concise report to help an actionable plan for adolescents on the street, deprived of education.

Family plays a fundamental role in meeting the health and social care needs of children, and they function as intermediaries between home and educational institution settings. Risk and protective factors can be organized into three spheres of influence as per the 2021 report of UNICEF: home and caregiving settings; safety and security and healthy attachments in preschools, schools and communities; and large-scale social determinants– such as poverty, disaster, conflict and discrimination. (Fund, 2021).

The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) released an audit report on the Implementation of Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009 on July 21, 2017. In 35 states/UTs, it was noted that the unutilized amounts ranged between Rs 12,259 crore to Rs 17,282 crore over the six year period[2]. (India C. a., 2017).

As per Note for Cabinet (October 2008), the financial requirement under the Act, based on population estimates in the age group of six to fourteen years, was estimated as 2.28 lakh crore for the period 2008-09 to 2014-15. As per Section 7(2) of the Act, the Central Government was to prepare estimates of capital and recurring expenditure for the implementation of the provisions of the Act. Regrettably, the Government has not allocated any separate budget for implementation of the Act till date. (India C. a., 2017).

Without legal framework, juveniles and street children will continue to be inconsistently identified by the systems, engendering gaps between education providers and difficulty connecting children with services. Over the past thirteen years in India, states and legal systems have implemented policies to support juvenile and street children. The Right to Education Act 2009, which requires the government to delineate a national strategy for recognizing and supporting child education, has potential to effect widespread change. An initiative to recognize, assist, include, support and educate street children has to have the commitment of leadership as well as financial backup and action from all stakeholders to protect the adolescents at crucial moments of development.

We used a critical literature review to specify components of inclusion to the right to education. To align this work with government policies including organizational policies or administrative guidance to standardize actions, we studied both the government and non-government reports. Due to paucity of time, there were no surveys conducted. Processes are actions that affect delivery—for example, the manner in which educators interact with students. Solutions that modify the structure or process to include educators could, in turn, facilitate the optimal use of legal provisions and government policies to help juveniles with serious issues maintain independence and remain longer in their educational system.

More than 15 books, reports and datasets were leveraged to identify the terrain of solutions and indicators of reach and effectiveness of policies and action plans. These studies, reports and analyses were drawn upon, to form hypotheses, and prioritize our findings and highlight the differences seen in the ground realities.

The critical literature review was conducted to develop the analysis to figure out the effectiveness of solutions. The review included papers published from 1995 to 2022 that examined situation of street children and their being included in or excluded from education and explored mechanisms for eliminating drop outs or in minimizing drop outs of the education system. All three authors reviewed papers at first the title and then the abstract level for eligibility, working to arrive at consensus and resolve discrepancies. We excluded papers that did not focus on street children while studying education systems.

“Street children are those for whom the street (in the widest sense of the word, i.e. unoccupied dwellings, wastelands, etc.) more than their family has become their real home, a situation in which there is no protection, supervision or direction from responsible adults.” [3] The definition was accepted by UNICEF from Nandana Reddy (1992), Street Children of Bangalore: A Situational Analysis.

There are 3 categories defined by UNICEF:

1. Children on the Street: Who have homes and mostly return to their families at the end of each day.

2. Children of the Street: Who live on the street. They have occasional contacts with their families.

3. Abandoned Children: Children who have severed all ties with their families.

Juvenile meaning in the Indian constitution is if a child is below the age of 18 so under the Indian Laws, Section 2 (k) of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act,2000 defines "juvenile" or "Child" as a person who has not completed eighteenth year of age.