Indian illiteracy and drop-out In November 1993 I went to Orissa in India, on a Minor-Field-Study project for SIDA, to study the drop-out problem, in other words why Indian children drop-out from school and don´t fulfill their education. To make my report I visited many different schools, from nursery schools and pre-schools to teachers training schools, private as well as governmental. I made interviews and observations and also studied some of the most important Indian pedagogues like Mahatma Gandhi and Sri Aurobindo. I found that the drop-out problem has social and economical as well as traditional and religious reasons, but also pedagocical ones. The education has to be meaningful and useful in the daily life of the pupils and for their future. I feel that the Indian schoolsystem has not succeeded in this pedagogical aspect. Therefor I find it important to continuously improve the teaching methods in the Indian schools.