'LKG fees have gone up to ₹3.7 lakh...': Bengaluru investor says education no more affordable, calls it 'real inflation'

A Bengaluru-based investor sparked a debate on the rising cost of education after he flagged a staggering increase in lower kindergarten fees in Hyderabad. 

The investor noted that the real inflation is evident in education rather than real estate, pointing to a steep rise in fees across India.

Aviral Bhatnagar, the founder of A Junior VC, in a post on X said LKG fees in Hyderabad have surged from ₹2.3 lakh to ₹3.7 lakh per annum. 

While the school wasn’t named, Bhatnagar said this increase is part of a broader trend. He argued that when adjusted for inflation, school fees have increased ninefold in the last three decades, with college fees witnessing an even more dramatic twentyfold rise.

Bhatnagar's concerns echo those of other observers. 

Author Manoj Arora pointed out that education, along with food and health, constitutes 70% of the expenses for an average middle-class family. He questioned the government’s official inflation figures, suggesting that the true inflation rate for essential services such as education is between 10-20% annually, far higher than the reported CPI inflation of 3-4%.

The issue has resonated with many on social media. Some users noted that the annual kindergarten fees now exceed the salary package of a fresher at companies like Cognizant, which recently faced criticism for offering what many consider an unlivable wage. 

Another user commented on the broader implications, stating that education has turned into a business, with little focus on fostering critical thinking.

Adding to the conversation, Sridhar Vembu, CEO of Zoho, expressed his concerns about the affordability of education. He attributed a significant portion of the cost to the skyrocketing prices of urban real estate, which, he argued, have been driven up by political corruption. 

"A lot of corruption money from politics is parked in real estate and that has inflated prices beyond normal market forces. In a sense, all of us pay for political corruption in the form of expensive housing, schools and healthcare," he wrote on X.

Vembu highlighted how expensive real estate has a cascading effect on other essential services. He also shared Zoho's efforts to make education affordable by investing in schools in deep rural areas, where land remains reasonably priced.