The government is in favor of granting more funds to the institutions providing quality education, on the condition that the standards are not diluted.
The sudden rapid growth of private universities is a big question to the quality and the standard of education in India. Although the University Grants Commission has been working on revising the parameters for the setting up of such universities; a colossal exercise has been proposed by the HRD Ministry (Union Human Resources Development) in which hundreds of acts and legislation according to which these universities are established will be examined in comparison with the latest upcoming parameters of UGC.
The idea of this exercise is to identify any lacunae or gaps that lead to indecisions in the maintenance of educational standard and ways to address them. This exercise is being led by UGC which is the manager of the higher education sector as it has already collected over 300 state acts. However, this exercise is likely to be commenced in the mid of November and a comprehensive picture of this exercise will only be given after being worked upon by a team of legal consultants in collaboration with the Niti Aayog. Steps are being taken to bring the legal consultants and UGC (University Grants Commission), together to focus and consider this prospect element; following directions from the HRD Minister-
Prakash Javadekar.
The work of revising the parameters has already been started by UGC. According to one of the Ministry Official, “There have been concerns about the standard of education in the hundreds of private universities spread across the country, and also about in maintaining the quality. There have been reports of varsities with insufficient infrastructure, including some functioning from just a few rooms.”
One of the officials said, “The government is in favor of granting more funds and more autonomy to institutions that provide quality education, but ensuring that standards are not diluted is a key premise. Therefore, it is believed this exercise would go a long way in addressing quality concerns.”
Keeping all this aside; nearly 8,000 cases are being analyzed by UGC and is completely involved in them as according to the officials the ambiguities in the existing legislation is the probable reason behind most of these legal matters. Officials also say that this analysis and study might help in suggesting ways, methods, techniques in which UGC’s burden can be lightened in the near future.
Former UGC member,
Inder Mohan Kapahy said,
“Some (Private Universities in India) are very good and some not as good. At times, even political pressure may lead to the formation of such a body. A key aspect is: the day an act or ordinance is passed, the body can give degrees. There should be some mechanism to ensure quality checks at the time of inception. In India, operations of a varsity have hardly ever been stopped. So it is important to have quality checks at the time of inception, particularly with regard to new private varsities.”
