Abstract
The Millennium Development Goals implicitly assume that the state has the prime responsibility of delivering basic education, ignoring the rapid private school growth. The present paper attempts to identify the causal effect of private school growth on youth literacy and enrolment rates, using the variation in private school growth in Indian districts. The average treatment effects generally mirror the district fixed effects estimates: the effect of private school growth on literacy and enrolment rates among 10-19 year olds remains positive and significant while the corresponding effect is much weaker for gender gap in literacy and enrolment rates.