Competing Societies and Conflicting Demands in Education Practice and Policy in India: Unravelling the relative powers of alternate interest groups an

To understand the prominence of politics in education, existing analyses adopt macropolitical and systematic perspectives, whereby the conflicting intents of political actors in the education system account for the distortion of policy and practice, particularly critiquing the negative space occupied by the self-interested bureaucrats. Thus, in advocating for greater accountability between citizens and the suppliers of education to minimise these distortions, several eminent studies emphasise on the need to reorganise the education system and facilitate a diffusion of power back to the 'community', through decentralisation and privatisation. However, I propose that these arguments rarely delve into scrutinising the conflicting interests within communities, instead grouping 'public interests' and 'communities' as homogenous domains. Social reality, in contrast, is far from homogenous. Moreover, whilst these studies have contributed instrumentally to the foundations of politics and accountability in education, related tools have thus far not been deployed to explore the voices of the key decision-makers and 'principals' in the education arena: Parents.