http://localhost/index.php

You have to do couple of steps to remove the public text from the URL

#1 Copy "index.php" and ".htaccess" files from the public folder and the paste on the root directory (eg. http://localhost)
#2 After pasting both files to the root folder, open the index.php from the root directory and edit the following line as shown below

$pathsPath = FCPATH . '../app/Config/Paths.php';
To
$pathsPath = FCPATH . 'app/Config/Paths.php';

Try this, It will work