Education a right, no more a privilege: ZEE5 partners with startup Eduauraa to make learning affordable

ZEE5, one of India’s largest ConTech brands has announced an exclusive partnership with startup Eduauraa, a premier digital learning platform. Together, they aim to democratise education by giving world-class quality educational content at an affordable price, empowering over 310 million students.

The idea to democratise education came to 23-year-old Columbia University alumnus Akanksha Chaturvedi, founder and CEO of Eduauraa, when she realised that technology had disrupted every industry and made it more affordable, accessible and convenient.

Expensive education

India has the world’s largest school-going population between the age bracket of 6 and 17, with over 310 million students. Over 55 per cent of Indian students take tuitions, and on an average, 11-12 per cent of a parent’s income goes on a single child’s education.

The cost of education has risen from Rs 55,000 to Rs 1,25,000 over the past decade, an increase of over 150 per cent. And despite spending a huge portion of their earnings, parents have no control over the quality of education their children get access to.

E-learning platforms in India remain expensive ranging from Rs 15,000 to Rs 2 lakh a year. When 85 per cent of India earns below Rs 8 lakh a year, how can we afford this? Eduauraa was founded with the aim to combine quality education with technology at the right price point, to reinstate education as a right and not a privilege and to support the government’s vision to make India one of the most educated countries in the world.

The strategic tie-up with the ZEE5’s OTT platform ensures the company gets the right distribution partner with access to over 75 million households across India.

Level playing field

Tarun Katial, CEO, ZEE5 India said, “Our larger vision at ZEE5 is to be able to build a rich repository of purposeful content across genres, which makes a ZEE5 subscription an investment for an individual to enjoy content viewing anytime, anywhere. Eduauraa coming on board with ZEE5 will help us strengthen our education content portfolio. With our wide reach across the country, including metros, tier-2 cities, tier-3 towns and villages, we hope to provide quality education to children in an engaging way at no extra cost.”

Chaturvedi said, “India can be transformed if superior quality education can reach every child. The challenge was that world-class education was expensive and only the rich could afford it. With a philosophy of empowering children and playing catalysts to equal opportunities, Eduauraa was created to democratise education by using technology, making premier quality education reach every corner of India at an affordable price.”

The tie-up was announced at an event in Delhi by HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, Punit Goenka, MD and CEO of Zee Enterprises Ltd, Katial and Chaturvedi.