Noting that no Indian University figured in the top 200 universities at global level, Director of National Assessment and Accreditation Council Prof D P Singh today called for suitable reforms for equipping and enabling Indian Higher Education institutions to achieve greater heights in academic expansion.
In his address at the 32nd convocation of Bharathiar University, Singh said the Indian higher education system is presently facing a growing number of challenges related to governance, regulation, quality, skill development, regional disparities, gender and social gaps, internationalization, employability and many more issues.
World class universities were research-intensive and focus on research publications and Awards; Reputation of the Institution; Teaching Learning Processes, Faculty-Student Ratio; Alumni Base; and International Faculty and Students.
"In our quest towards creating world class institutions of higher learning we need to make suitable reforms for equipping and enabling Indian Higher Education institutions to achieve greater heights in academic expansion, excellence and innovation."
These institutions can achieve the very purpose of their existence only when they are allowed to function with sufficient academic, administrative and financial autonomy, he said.
Regulatory reforms with minimization of interventions can bring substantive changes in the system for achieving Equity, Access, Quality, Excellence and Value based higher education, Singh said.
It is equally important to bring 'Accountability' along with 'Autonomy' in the institutions of higher education and the benefits of autonomy can be fully realized only when accountability was ensured through good governance, a well defined, organized, structured, transparent system for smooth conduct of operations, he said.
"It is our responsibility to ensure that we must strive for achieving highest levels of quality in academic performance and take necessary measures in those direction."
"Assessment and audits played an important role in this process as they provide the reality check by bringing out the gap between where we stand today and where we want to go," Singh said and expressed confidence that very soon Indian universities would also appear in the list of Best Universities of the World.
