Title page 1

Contents 1

Abstract 3

1. Introduction 4

2. Data 6

2.1. Baseline sampling 6

2.2. Follow-ups 6

2.3. Learning assessments 8

3. Results 8

3.1. Learning loss in December 2021 8

3.2. Partial recovery after December 2021 10

3.3. Full recovery by March-May 2023 11

4. Conclusions 12

References 12

Appendix 23

A. Additional tables and figures 23

B. Student achievement tests 31

Table 1. Balance on respondent characteristics across survey rounds in 2021-2022 18

Table 2. Balance on respondent characteristics across survey rounds in 2023 19

Table 3. Learning loss between August 2019 and December 2021 20

Table 4. Recovery from learning loss 21

Figure 1. Timeline of school closures and data collection activities 16

Figure 2. Learning loss and recovery in test scores across survey waves 17

Table A.1. Comparing the baseline sample to National Family Health Survey (NFHS-V) - Household characteristics 23

Table A.2. Comparing attriters to non-attriters 24

Table A.3. Comparing attriters to non-attriters in detail 25

Table A.4. Learning loss with age fixed effects 26

Table A.5. Recovery with age fixed effects 27

Table A.6. Learning loss and recovery restricting the sample to children 55-95 months old at the time of the survey 28

Table A.7. Pace of recovery 29

Table A.8. Learning pace 29

Figure A.1. Learning loss and recovery in test scores across survey waves: % of correct answers 30

Figure B.2. Proportion of children with correct answers for different math questions across rounds and ages 32

Figure B.3. Proportion of children with correct answers for different math questions across rounds and ages 33

Figure B.4. Proportion of children with correct answers for different math questions across rounds and ages 34

Figure B.5. Proportion of children with correct answers for different Tamil questions across rounds and ages 35

Figure B.6. Proportion of children with correct answers for different Tamil questions across rounds and ages 36

Figure B.7. Proportion of children with correct answers for different Tamil questions across rounds and ages 37

Figure B.8. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for Tamil questions 1-9 39

Figure B.9. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for Tamil questions 10-18 40

Figure B.10. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for Tamil questions 19-27 41

Figure B.11. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for Tamil questions 28-36 42

Figure B.12. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for Tamil questions 37-45 43

Figure B.13. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for Tamil questions 46-53 44

Figure B.14. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for math questions 1-9 45

Figure B.15. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for math questions 10-18 46

Figure B.16. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for math questions 19-27 47

Figure B.17. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for math questions 28-36 48

Figure B.18. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for math questions 37-45 49

Figure B.19. Empirical fit to the estimated ICC for math questions 46-49 50