Rajasthan’s PM SHRI Push Turns 639 Schools Into ‘Centres of Excellence’

More than 639 government schools in Rajasthan are being upgraded under the Centre’s PM SHRI (Prime Minister Schools for Rising India) scheme, marking one of the state’s most ambitious interventions in public school education in recent years. The initiative aims to reposition select schools as “Centres of Excellence”, equipped to reflect the pedagogical and infrastructural vision outlined in the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.

According to state education officials, these PM SHRI schools are being fitted with digital libraries, online laboratories (O-Labs), smart classrooms and technology-enabled teaching tools. The focus is not merely on infrastructure but on changing how students learn, moving away from rote instruction towards experiential and application-based education. Practical learning modules are expected to bridge gaps between the curriculum and real-world skills.

A key component of the programme is leadership and capacity-building training for teachers and school heads. Administrators argue that institutional reform cannot succeed without parallel investments in educators, who are expected to adopt new teaching methods, digital platforms and assessment models aligned with competency-based learning.

While the scale of the rollout is significant, the long-term impact will depend on sustained funding, teacher preparedness and equitable access across regions. As Rajasthan positions these schools as benchmarks for public education reform, the challenge will be ensuring that excellence does not remain confined to a few but gradually reshapes the wider government school system.