Instead of taking into account local conditions and market demands, India tries to imitate the West
Instead of taking into account local conditions and market demands, India tries to imitate the West
Discussing international rankings of higher education institutions (HEIs) has now become an annual ritual in India when global ranking systems such as the QS World University Rankings are announced. QS World University Rankings ranks HEI on the following components: Academic Reputation (40%), Employer Reputation (10%), Faculty Student Ratio (20%), Citations per Faculty (20%), International Faculty Ratio (5%) and International Student Ratio (5%). International Research Network and employment results were 0% for this edition.
However, it is heartening to see that the number of Indian institutions in the top 1,000 globally has increased from 22 last year to 27, and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore has risen 31 places to emerge as the highest ranker. There has been no serious debate on the poor performance of Indian universities in the 2023 edition, except for the Indian Institute of Eminence (IOE). IOEs occupy a special place because they are granted greater academic and administrative autonomy, and public IOEs receive additional funding. Therefore, their dominance in the top 500 in the QS World University Rankings is no surprise.
step treatment
There is also huge disparity among other higher education institutions. According to the All India Survey on Higher Education (2019-20), out of 1,043 higher education institutions in the country, 184 are centrally funded institutions. The Government of India generously allocates financial resources to these institutions. However, the financial assistance provided by state governments to state HEIs is far from adequate, even though state public universities (13,97,527) have the highest number of graduate students, followed by state open universities (9 ,22,944) are. ‘ Enrollment. State-sponsored HEIs hardly pay salaries and pensions.
While the number of universities increased by about 30.5% in 2019-20 as compared to 2015-16, the academic and administrative infrastructure has not been strengthened to match this increase. The apathetic attitude we observe in filling up the posts of teachers has further deteriorated the quality of teaching and research at HEI. In fact, the quality education and world-class research output that policy makers expect from state public universities is elusive as these HEIs never had the financial and other resources to achieve academic and professional development.
On the other hand, the liberally funded institutions perform better than their state sponsored counterparts on all academic performance indicators – faculty strength, modern laboratories, infrastructure creation, digitized libraries, sponsored research project grants, computing facilities etc. Therefore, state-funded HEIs would not do well in these rankings, it was a conclusion. This is a result of an unequal and unfair system in the Indian higher education system, where state sponsored HEIs are provided step-motherly treatment and are in a poor position as compared to centrally funded institutions. No ranking system ranks institutions rationally after examining their administrative challenges, infrastructural constraints and financial difficulties; They only focus on performance metrics based on academic strength and other achievements. For India to perform better in these rankings, we need to pay more attention to the higher education institutions of the state.
NEP Vision
The National Policy on Education (NEP) 2020 envisages all HEIs to become multidisciplinary institutions by 2040. It aims to increase the Gross Enrollment Ratio in higher education including vocational education from 26.3% in 2018 to 50% by 2035. The NEP also aims to ensure that by 2030 each district has at least one large multidisciplinary higher education institution in or near it. This means that single-stream specialized institutions will eventually be phased out.
However, the fact that leading multidisciplinary universities such as Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi University, University of Hyderabad and Jamia Millia Islamia have slipped in the QS World University Rankings, prompts national think tanks to reconsider the NEP’s proposal in this regard. should be forced. A close study of QS World University Rankings reveals that single-stream specialized HEIs like Indian Institute of Technology and IISc have performed better than their multidisciplinary counterparts. Apart from IISc, Bangalore, eight IITs (Delhi, Bombay, Madras, Kanpur, Kharagpur, Roorkee, Guwahati and Indore) have been placed in the top 500 globally. IIT-Indore ranks highest among second generation IITs by securing 396th position and IIT-BHU marks its first appearance in the 651-700 band.
A scheme is also being considered in the NEP for multidisciplinary education and research universities to achieve the highest global standards in quality education. While everyone is seeking multidisciplinary education, the performance of specific HEIs in the QS World Rankings is a testament to their superiority over multidisciplinary/multi-faculty institutions. The idea of converting a specialized institution into a multi-faculty university does not bode well for an economy run by specialist professionals. It would be surprising if the IITs decided to offer courses in physical education and medicine or the National Law Universities offered graduate degree programs in mechanical engineering.
It is important to emphasize here that no one is against the idea of multidisciplinary/multi-faculty education, if there is 15% to 20% flexibility in the total academic strength. But converting all higher education institutions into multidisciplinary institutions is not an idea that holds water given the unique circumstances and demands in India. No study or data supports the idea of turning particular institutions into multidisciplinary/multi-faculty universities. Such an idea would have worked in the West where HEIs invest substantial resources in multidisciplinary research through private and public research grants and funding. But the ‘one size fits all’ approach may not be helpful for India. The need of the hour is to build and develop our higher education system keeping in mind the Indian conditions and market demands.
Milind Kumar Sharma is Professor in the Department of Production and Industrial Engineering, MBM University, Jodhpur, erstwhile MBM Engineering College, Jodhpur. thoughts are personal