Dr
H Chaturvedi
Alternate
President, EPSI & Director, BIMTECH
Whenever a ranking of World Class
universities and institutions is published, Indian institutions hardly find a
place in such listings except in engineering and management. When universities from China, Hongkong,
Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan are listed in global ranking, it creates
heartburning among the Indian policy makers and planners because these
countries are rather recent entrants in landscape of higher education. India’s higher education has a history of 155 years
since the first three universities were set up at Calcutta, Bombay and Madras
in 1857. Currently India has more than 660
universities and 45,000 colleges which makes India as the 3rd
largest among higher education systems in the world.
Why our universities and institutions are
unable to complete globally and to attract students and faculty around the
world? In many world class universities
and institutions like Harvard, Wharton, Kellogg, Yale, MIT, INSEAD, LBS and
Cambridge, one may find people of Indian origin doing well as faculty and also
working as deans, deputy deans etc. Quite
a few of them have been educated in Indian universities and institutions which
validates that there is no dearth of talent in India.
Before elucidating the roadmap for building
world class institutions in India and identifying some of the obstacles being
faced, it will be worthwhile to dwell up on what indeed is a world class
institution. A glance at methodologies followed
by the Financial Times, SJTU and the Economist speak about the leadership,
vision and mission, research focus and diversity in faculty and students as the
main factors in the evaluation of a world class University or institution. A world class institution needs a good amount
of autonomy to decide its long term and short term policies. This may not be possible unless these
institutions are financially self sufficient.
Harvard University is a good example of financial autonomy since its
endowment fund is valued around $ 35 billion dollars (around Rs.192,500
crores).
Indian Higher Education is currently facing
a dilemma of pursuing expansion and excellence together. There have been several political compulsions
behind the exponential growth of higher education in India. In pursuit of improving the Gross Enrollment
Ratio (GER), vital ingredients of quality and excellence have been overlooked.
World class institutions and universities
always require a grand vision about academic excellence, innovation and
research. It can be nurtured and
developed by a team of academic leaders who are led by a visionary and capable
Vice Chancellor or a Dean. A Vice
Chancellor or a Dean can function effectively only when he or she is empowered
by owners (government in case of public university) with a relatively longer
tenure, say, 5 to 10 years.
There are many institutions and
universities in the country which are most suitable to be classified as world
class within a decade or so.
Institutions like IIMs, IITs, ISC, ISB and universities like BHU, AMU,
JNU, DU, BITS, Thapar, MAHE etc. have reached a level of maturity and can be developed
in to world class within a decade or so.
What do they require? They
require more funds, more autonomy and better linkages with the industry who are
the users of their passing out graduates and research output.
Road
Map -2025
During the 12th and 13th
Five Year Plans, lot of emphasis can be given to convert some of the reputed
Indian institutions and universities into world class institutions. For this herculean task, both the public and
private sectors will have to work collaboratively because a collaborative
approach is the only way. For creating world
class Institutions, we need aspirational leadership at all levels and also the requisite
freedom of action for delivering results.
Freedom of action to be given to VCs, rectors, deans and directors will demand
require that critical decisions related to whom to teach, what to teach, how to
teach, who will teach and from where to mobilize funds, which are to be taken
by the academic leaders. Granting
‘Freedom of Action’ to the academic leaders will not be an easy process because
‘ owners’ will not agree to it readily.
Building world class institutions will also
require huge investments in higher education both by the government and the private
sector. Currently, India spends 1.2 per
cent of its GDP on higher education.
Additionally, almost 1.8 per cent of GDP is spent by householders
(mostly as tuition fees) and the private sector (mostly as capital investment)
taken together. We need to spend at
least 4 per cent of GDP on higher education for making some of the Indian
Higher Education institutions as world class.
For building world class institutions,
Indian Higher Education will also require some soul searching and
introspection. During the last few
decades, a large number of institutions have been set up by politicians,
ex-bureacrats, traders and entrepreneurs.
For some of them, higher education is just like any other business. Instead of paying attention on quality and
accountability, they try to recover their capital investment as early as possible
by resorting to many undesirable activities.
This kind of ‘rent-seeking’ and ‘profiteering’ should not be
allowed. The Supreme Court of India in
some of its landmark judgments has permitted ‘reasonable-surplus’ for
educational institution which can be used for various development purposes.
Mr Kapil Sibal, during his tenure as
Minister of HRD has proposed 11 bills aiming various kinds of reforms. ‘Prohibition of Unfair Practices by Technical
Education Institutions, Medical Education Intuitions and universities Bill –
2010’ was an attempt to curb various kinds of malpractices like capitation fee and
the like. There has been strident
opposition to these bills because of the fear of centralization and giving
enormous discretionary powers to the bureaucracy. Many state governments are also not in favour
of these bills because their powers in higher education are likely be usurped
by the Union Government.
Philip G Altbach, who has devoted 50 years
on doing researching about the Indian Higher Education, has written a thought
provoking article which is titled “ A World Class Country without World-Class
Higher Education’ : India’s 21’s Century Dilemma”. In this article he says-
India
cannot build internationally recognized research-oriented universities
overnight, but the country has the key elements in place to begin and sustain
the process. India will need to create a
dozen or more universities that can compete internationally to fully
participate in the new world economy.
Without these universities, India is destined to remain a scientific
backwater. *
*Source :A World Class Country without
World Class Higher Education : India’s 21st Century Dilemma : International
Higher Education Vol. 40 (Fall), 2005 pp.18-20 by Philip G Altbach
