How government fails to understand higher education

At the time Indian Constitution was being drafted, there was a raging debate over whether education should fall in the Union list or should it be solely a state subject.

After detailed debates and discussions, it was decided that education should be part of the concurrent list. Both state governments and the Centre have a power to decide on matters part of the concurrent list, with Centre enjoying the overriding powers. It is since then that education wasn't taken seriously by either of the two.

Putting the subject on the concurrent list led to vast educational disparities across India. For example, there are states such as Kerala, Mizoram and Goa whose literacy rates are over 80 per cent but at the same time states like Bihar, Telangana, Arunachal Pradesh and Rajasthan border around 65 per cent or so.

However, higher education is a topic wider than measuring literacy or counting the number of people enrolled in various courses at different universities and colleges. Higher education is about production of human resource and knowledge. The example of what higher education should aim for has been set by institutions such as Oxford, Cambridge, Stanford, and Peking University with the vast amount of research work done and ideas propounded.

In India, we need to ask our policymakers what is their idea of higher education. Do they understand that higher education can't be treated just like school education, but needs a different approach?

What the government is actually trying to do is to focus only on increasing enrolment to make their political report cards look better. The quality of education is, of course, a neglected and overlooked domain.

Another problem with the higher education policy is the mushrooming of private colleges and universities which is aimed solely at money making. Many such private institutions have become a way of converting black money into white, which ironically, happens in the name of charity.

We understand that India is a vast country with a huge population and needs a large number of educational institutions. But these institutions shouldn't just hand out degrees but also impart quality education.

A large number of private universities sprung up in India when the licence raj ended in 1991 and the era of liberalisation began. These universities fast adjusted their curriculum to meet the market demands with absolutely no regard for imparting knowledge or encouraging innovation. These institutions were set up by capitalists with an aim to produce a workforce suited for their marketing and production units.

The idea of deemed university that gradually took over higher education was actually nothing but a web of institutions that ensured good placements for their students in multinational companies.

Former prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru had once remarked, "A university should endeavour to promote the principles of national integration, social justice, secularism, democratic way of life, international understanding and scientific approach to the problems of society."

Even a rough comparison shows that India's school education system is way ahead of higher education models in achieving its goals, though school education system too needs an overhaul to meet global standards.

It is time we start transforming India's education system and design it in a way that is best suited to produce knowledge that can be of help for the welfare of the society at large.

The deemed university project under the University Grants Commission is not good enough to cope up with the structural issues of university education.

We need to devise a system that follows a chain of continuity from school education to higher education. We can't just call universities and colleges institutions of higher learning because we can't call them schools. They need to set a standard of education that is expected of higher educational universities.

Being a welfare state, it is the responsibility of the Indian government to provide basic education to every citizen. Higher enrolment is important but not the sole criterion to judge the success or failure of higher education.

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