Integrating Mental Health into School Education: A Review of Indian Educational Reforms and Child Rights Perspectives

This review summarizes studies on Integrating mental health into school education in India, educational reforms, child rights perspectives, curriculum development, teacher training, student support systems, historical evolution, current status, legal frameworks, advocacy efforts, practical implementation strategies, theoretical frameworks to fill gaps in policy implementation and program effectiveness.The purpose of the review was to assess the reforms and policy systems in education, standardize curriculum and teacher training, support systems of students, legal and historical background, and provide a comparative analysis of theoretical frameworks used to guide mental health integration.The systematic review of the available literature was performed on a sample of the empirical, policy-related, and theoretical research published until 2024 and based on the relatedness to the National Education Policy 2020, the fidelity of intervention, stakeholder involvement, and theoretical implementation.Results indicate that there is a high policy congruency with NEP 2020 that focuses on counselling, social-emotional learning, and life skills, but the strategy has not been implemented in an integrated manner owing to the level of resource allocation and the irregular training of teachers.Curriculum integration has a bright prospect, but it lacks the element of variation and cultural adaptation.Multi-tipered student support systems prove to be feasible, especially based on task-shifting models that take into consideration teachers, but scalability and stigma remain a problem.The legal frameworks support the rights of children and the promotion of their mental health but have no unified implementation and intersectoral coordination.Interventions are supported by theoretical frameworks that do not always make it into practice.The findings all lead to the conclusion that culturally adapted, scalable, and sustainable strategies require strong policy implementation and capacity building.The review will guide the future policy, curriculum design, teacher development, and support to the student to improve the holistic mental health outcomes in the Indian schools.