Education plays an important role in the Human Resource Development and a remedial role in balancing the socio‐economic fabric of the Country. Since citizens of India are its most valuable resource, our billion‐strong nation needs the nurture and care in the form of basic education to achieve a better quality of life. This warrants an all‐round development of our citizens, which can be achieved by building strong foundations in education. In pursuance of this mission, the Ministry of Education (MoE) was created on September 26, 1985, through the 174th amendment to the Government of India (Allocation of Business) Rules, 1961. Currently, the MoE works through two departments: They are (a) Department of School Education and Literacy (b) Department of Higher Education.

To describe the status of higher education in the country, Ministry of Education has endeavored to conduct an annual web-based All India Survey of Higher Education (AISHE) since 2010-11. The survey covers all the institutions in the country engaged in imparting of higher education. Data is being collected on several parameters such as teachers, student enrollment, programmes, examination results, education finance, infrastructure. Indicators of educational development such as institution density, Gross Enrollment Ratio, Pupil-teacher ratio, Gender Parity Index, per student expenditure will also be calculated from the data collected through AISHE. These are useful in making informed policy decisions and research for development of education sector.