As part of the AM/NS India Times Critical Thinking Championship (TCTC), training in questioning and analysis skills has reached 568,653 students across 3,562 schools located in 959 cities and 26 states and territories.
For Paresh Das, a 10th-grade student at Srimaa Govt High School, the most important lesson was not speeding up answers, but learning to slow down. He noted that he used to answer quickly, but during this event, he realized the need to first think through his answer. His new four-step formula is: 'Stop, think, ask, and check.'
This shift from automatic reaction to reasoned judgment is at the core of TCTC. A significant portion of participants, about 4.3 million people—nearly three-quarters of all—are in grades 3 through 8. Specifically, Grade 3 has 94,873 students, followed by Grades 6 (71,436), 7 (70,000), and 8 (66,998). Additionally, 90,536 students are in Grades 9 and 10.
The highest number of participants comes from the state of Uttar Pradesh with 398,266 participants, as well as Uttarakhand (82,138), Himachal Pradesh (42,617), and Bihar (41,112), while other states have smaller groups.
The initiative uses interactive sessions and scenario-based questions to help students distinguish facts from opinions, identify assumptions, study evidence, and explain how they arrived at a conclusion. The emphasis is not so much on providing the correct answer as it is on making the reasoning process itself visible.
This distinction is becoming increasingly significant in classrooms where two powerful forces coexist: the traditional culture of examinations, which has always encouraged memorization, and the digital environment, where search engines, social media, and artificial intelligence can instantly generate answers. Information is abundant, while skills of verification, reasoning, and judgment are becoming increasingly rare.
Student feedback demonstrates an understanding of this difference. One student from Srimaa Govt High School stated: 'Usually, I have to learn and memorize. Here, I have to think,' adding that asking questions during learning can improve subject retention.
Another student reported that the sessions offered a different approach to problem-solving: instead of panicking, one should ask why the problem arose, break it down into parts, and work through possible answers. This student concluded that 'the solution then becomes obvious.'
A third review concerned the difficulty of dealing with contradictory information. The student noted that confusion often arises regarding what to believe among multiple versions and how to reach a conclusion. He believes that the 'STOP-THINK-ASK-CHECK' method can become a useful habit for getting closer to the truth.
This direction aligns with the goals pursued by NEP 2020 and the National Curriculum 2023—shifting school education from mechanical reproduction to competencies, application, and conceptual understanding. However, policy may change examination sheets faster than habits in classrooms change. Critical thinking requires that students be encouraged not just for knowledge, but for the ability to question, test, and, if necessary, revise their beliefs.
In the age of artificial intelligence, this may become an even greater challenge for education. Machines are increasingly capable of generating the first answer, so students will need to know whether it deserves to be the final one.