Open Educational Resources in India: A Critical Narrative Review of Policy, Infrastructure, Adoption and Evidence

Abstract

Open educational resources (OER) have become strategically important to India because they offer a route to widening educational access while permitting educational materials to be reused, adapted and redistributed. India has also built an unusually large public digital-education ecosystem, including national repositories, course platforms and school infrastructures. Yet the presence of free digital content does not itself establish an OER ecosystem: openness depends on licensing and practical permissions, while educational value depends on discoverability, accessibility, curricular integration, institutional support and effective pedagogy. This critical narrative review evaluates the status of OER in India across conceptual, policy, infrastructural, adoption, pedagogical and equity dimensions. Literature published from 2002 to 28 June 2026 was examined through education-focused and multidisciplinary scholarly sources, supplemented by official Indian and international policy and platform documents. The evidence indicates substantial progress in publicly funded content creation and national-scale digital delivery, with NROER, NPTEL, e-PG Pathshala/Vidya-mitra, SWAYAM and DIKSHA forming important parts of the wider open-education landscape. However, these initiatives differ materially in licensing, adaptability, curricular function and institutional integration, and should not be treated as interchangeable forms of OER. Indian empirical research generally reports favourable attitudes towards OER and perceived usefulness, but actual use, Creative Commons literacy, institutional policy support and reuse practices remain uneven. The evidence base is dominated by cross-sectional surveys, single-institution or geographically bounded studies and self-reported outcomes; robust India-specific evidence on learning achievement, persistence, equity, cost, adaptation and long-term sustainability remains limited. Global evidence suggests that OER can preserve learning outcomes while reducing access barriers, but average achievement effects are small and implementation-dependent. The review argues that India has advanced further in open digital provision than in mature open educational practice. Future progress requires licence clarity, interoperable metadata, multilingual adaptation, accessibility, faculty and library capacity, institutional incentives, rigorous outcome evaluation and governance that treats openness as a pedagogical and rights-enabling property rather than a synonym for free online access.