In an attempt to make higher education inclusive, President Pratibha Devisingh Patil, in her address to the Joint Session of the 15th Lok Sabha, said: “The government’s strategy for higher education will be formulated around a three-fold objective of expansion, inclusion and excellence.”
The suggestions given by the National Knowledge Commission (NKC), whose term ended in March this year, will guide the formulation and implementation of the strategy.
Sam Pitroda-headed NKC had recommended the setting up of an independent regulatory authority for knowledge development, apart from the existing University Grants Commission (UGC), to help in areas like quality control and growth and also assist in providing accreditation policies.
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“A National Council for Higher Education as recommended by the Yash Pal Committee and the National Knowledge Commission to bring in reform of regulatory institutions,” said Patil.
Like the NKC, the Yash Pal committee had suggested that all the regulatory bodies should be scrapped and a higher education commission be set up to monitor different aspects of higher education. But this idea did not get support from the UGC and the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE). Besides, it also called for doing away with the deemed university system, divesting professional course regulators like the AICTE and the Medical Council of India of all academic functions and expanding IITs and IIMs to fullfledged varsities.
The Yash Pal Committee had asked the government to change its definition of university to free it from the hands of bureaucracy, make it autonomous and have a single higher education commission, which is as powerful as the Election Commission and replaces agencies like the UGC and Indian Medical Council.
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“We do not agree with the way vice chancellors have been appointed. We have also expressed concern over certain provisions of the Central Universities Bill,” Pitroda had said.
In three years, the NKC gave over 300 recommendations to the government on 27 different subjects but maintained that the implementation was slow. It also wanted the creation of a National Knowledge Network, formation of National Science and Social Science Foundation (NS3F) and passing a legislation to help universities and research institutions file patents in their own name and forge commercialisation processes with the industry.
It also took exception to the way the government appointed vice chancellors for 15 new Central Universities in the country.The President has also emphasised on developing a “brain gain” policy to attract talent from all over the world into the 14 universities proposed in the 11th Plan to position them as “Innovation Universities”.