Moving a bill to amend National Institutes of Technology, Science Education and Research Act 2007 in the Lok Sabha, HRD minister Prakash Javadekar said the changes will enable two institutes at Berhampur and Tirupati to be governed by the legislation.
With the passage of the Bill, the number of Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISER) will go up to seven from the existing five, he said.
This institutes promote research and innovation in basic sciences, unlike the IITs, he said.
Every year, the Budget for all IISERs was Rs 900 crore, while it was Rs 300 crore for Indian Institute of Science.
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"Every effort is made to ensure that adequate funds are available to various centres of excellence and there will not be any shortage of funds for them," he said.
The focus of the government is to promote quality education and the purpose of quality education is to produce good human beings, he said, adding that subjects of humanities were also taught and research programmes are promoted.
Besides, there is a shortage of faculty at the Tirupati institute, she said quoting media reports and adding that the admission to research programmes have also been delayed by one year.
Deb said there was an issue of unemployment as far as engineering graduates are concerned, which points to the fact that skills do not match with the job market requirements.
Out of 8 lakh engineers passing out every year, 5 lakh remain unemployed, she said quoting a government report.
Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank' (BJP) said science and research play important role in development of any country. The government was promoting research and innovation by setting up new institutes, he said.
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Prabhas Kumar Singh (BJD) said a large number of students were migrating abroad as they were not getting job opportunities here. "This is a big challenge for higher education in India," he said urging the the Ministry to look into the quality of education.
He said Indian universities and institutes do not rank anywhere among the top institutes in the world and sought filling up of vacancies there, saying the best academics should get jobs in these educational institutions.
Observing that a uniform syllabus, fees and rules should be implemented for the entire country instead of being different in different states, he said "this is important for providing quality education." Rao said focus should be given in making IITs and NITs international level institutes.
P K Biju (CPI-M) said the government has given 'centre of excellence' status to several institutes "but what is the current status of those institutes".
While timely allocation of funds was important for growth of these institutes, there was shortage of faculty and other problems which impacted their quality, he added.
Citing certain reports, he said every day 20 students commit suicides. "Why is this happening? ... It is a matter of serious concern. Youths are committing suicide," he said, claiming that dalit and reserved category students were killing themselves and demanded action against those responsible for this.
Renuka Buta (YSRCP) sought to make Tirupati an education hub of the country and urged the government to fulfill all the commitments including giving the special category status to Andhra Pradesh.
N K Premachandran (RSP) said the disparity in the access to education needs to be bridged. The downtrodden people are deprived of best and quality education, he said and pointed at the rising number of private institutes compared to those run by the government.
Due to this, the poor are being deprived of education, he said, demanding increase in the number of public aided institutions. Increasing private institutions will be a "curse" to the nation, he said, while seeking a review of the structure of the UGC.
The others who participated in the discussion included B B Patil (TRS) and Nihal Chand Chauhan (BJP).