AIU raises red flag on unemployment & wants new education policy should target for 120 % cent employ-ability in professional education sector
As Unemployment is assuming alarming proportions in India, Eminent Academician Prof. PB Sharma,
and President of Association of Indian Universities (AIU) has asserted that new
education policy, being framed now, should be targeted to boost employability
of professional education, from currently 15-20 % to 120% on one hand and
ensuring relevance of research and innovations to the needs of the society and
industry at home on the other.
He says it should also meet the regional and global aspirations, adding “
We need to align India's Education Policy to National Development to pay
attention to creating “Advantage India” from the efforts we invest in education
and research and make education a powerful vehicle of societal transformation.,
“
Unfortunately, the
goal of successive education policies in the past revolved around increasing
access in the name of increased Gross Enrolment Ratio, GER, in higher education
and inclusive education being grossly misunderstood as driving everyone towards
university education while focus on quality and relevance took a back seat. The
net result being that we have achieved significant increase in GER, currently
just over 25% but with utterly low quality of out-turn and also low employability.
After all you get what you plan!
So the prime
question is whether the new education policy this time shall have a radical
departure from the approach to policy formulation in the past?
Addressing 92annual conference
of Vice Chancellors at Sarnath, Varanasi recently , he said to begin with,
we would have liked that an approach paper to the new education policy
should have been drafted with due diligence by the Niti Ayog and it should have
clearly spelled out the major goals of the new policy. But now at least we
have a few drafts of new education policy such as that of T S R Subramaniam
report and a well-articulated vision documents.
(Informatively, a reputed academician, Prof. P.B.
Sharma, currently the Vice Chancellor of Amity University Gurgaon has been the
founder Vice-Chancellor of Delhi Technological University and also founder
Vice-Chancellor of Rajiv Gandhi Technology University. Prof. Sharma is a former
Professor of IIT Delhi, former President of Engineering Science Division of
Indian Science Congress, former Chairman of Indian Society of Mechanical
Engineers and former Vice-Chairman of World Confederation of Productivity
Sciences, India Section as FICCI Higher Education Report of 2012 and Yes Bank Global Institute
report on Higher education in India, 2017.)
AIU on its part in
its submission to the New Education Policy Drafting Committee in November last
year has made it clear that unless the new education policy is targeted to
provide to the Nation a policy thrust to make education a powerful vehicle for
National Development and attaining global esteem, education in India shall
continue to reel under the crisis of poor quality and loss of values.
According to him, The AIU document presented to the Dr Kasturirangan Committee advocates
for focus on “relevance driven excellence”, making Universities as the "
Factories of Job Creation", harnessing creativity and innovativeness by
making universities as "Cradles of Innovation and New Enterprise
Development" and engaging the young inspired minds of students by
promoting extended “learning by doing” rather than master minding the contents
of the text books as in the past.
The AIU documents
also strongly advocates for autonomy of the universities and institutions of
higher learning, but with a caution that autonomy and accountability should go
hand in hand so that autonomy becomes "Freedom to Excel" and not
the "Freedom to Exploit" as in past. It is here the role of
regulators is not to prescribe the curriculum but to enforce quality standards
and facilitate the growth of scholarship and knowledge creation.
The new education
drafting committee headed by Dr K Kasturirangan is well advised to look into
the draft national education framework left behind by Dr Sam Pitroda in his
Knowledge Commission Report to the Nation 2006 and 2007 where integration of
Education with Research and integration of Knowledge and Skills have been
strongly advocated.
Dr Kasturirangan
Committee is also well advised to take note that while on one hand India is
reeling under the crisis of loss of human values and lack of focus on national
and global aspirations, the integration of education with values should form a
strong pillar of strength of the new education system that the new education
policy intends shall promote.
“We the Vice
Chancellors of Indian universities with the collective wisdom at our command should
recommend to the Government of India to setup “10 Gurukuls of modern India” as the marvels for intellectual wisdom
alongside nurturing universal values of “Satya
mev Jayate”, Purity of thought and action, “mansa vacha karmana” as ordained in the Vedas, Humility, Peace and
Harmony that shall drive the agenda of Education for Global Peace and
Sustainable Development.”
He said the
inclusive education should be redefined. The inclusive education that the new
education policy intend to promote should mean inclusion and integration of
education with values, education for employability and entrepreneurship and
education for Nation building and for creating global esteem.” Let the signature
towers of the universities of tomorrow be the Knowledge and Innovation
Incubation towers and Centers of Human Development promoting universal human
values, work ethics and professional morality”.
Batting for Paradigm shift in Research work, he said Universities and
Institutions of higher learning are to be the lifeline of the local industries
and drivers for change both at national and global levels to cause technology
revolution and innovative new product development. This requires a paradigm
shift in the way research is carried out in the universities and in
institutions of higher learning.
We need to devise
mechanisms which supports the growth of Solution Research and with the active
participation of the industries engages the innovative minds of the faculty and
students in developing technology, knowhow and innovations that shall give rise
to the growth of new enterprises.
The new structure of the Higher Education in India need to rejuvenate the
universities to create the desired ecosystem for Solution Research, Technology
Incubation and supportive environment for I2IP, ideas to innovated products and
commercialization. In short, it call for a major departure in our approach from
“Universities as centers of learning and scholarship” to “Universities as Global
Knowledge Enterprises”. Centers of learning and scholarship, technology
incubation, innovation and enterprise development. Universities then shall
adopt the mantra “Knowledge to Prosperity” and become the propulsive thrust for
accelerating the Socio- Economic development of the society.
”I must not hesitate to add that
while Innovations are a great creative power to make a better world, they are
also a great disruptive power! Often the power of disruption is much more than
what could be comprehended and assessed. Therefore, we in the universities must
be prepared to produce the manpower of tomorrow as also to retrain the manpower
of today to manage this disruption caused by new and exciting innovations.
Agility in the age of disruption and uncertainty is something new and we the
leaders of the universities in India must take up this challenge head on.
He said The need of the hour is therefore to
nurture interdisciplinary education, engage in cutting edge research, cultivate
translational and solution research and foster creativity and innovations in
abundance and take them to the level of commercially viable technologies and products
of vital value to make India a world leader in quality education and research.
He called upon VCS to collaborate not only with the best in the
world but also to collaborate and cooperate between our universities in India,
create regional and national network of Indian universities and pool together capabilities and transform our universities in
India as the world leaders. es
He paid warm tributes to Dalai Lama who inaugurated
the 92nd
Annual Meet of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU) at Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies, at Sarnath .
Prof Sharma told VCs
that historic meet was taking place at a time when the resurgence of India as
the brightest star of the East is being acknowledged by the world at large. As
such it is responsibility of Vice Chancellors, in the universities in India to
make universities a major partner in progress for the making of a New India, a
developed and prosperous India of our dream.
“To do this, we need to create the
enterprising and creative minds in our universities and thus transform our
universities as the “factories of Innovation, Technology Incubation and
Enterprise development” alongside with producing Industry-ready-professionals
for the new knowledge age which is
rapidly descending in our industry, trade, business and governance, and in fact
in all aspects of human endeavors”.
He hoped that the
synergy of mind created at this meet shall enable us to present a road map of growth
and development of higher education that shall assure quality of education,
relevance of our research and innovations and accelerated growth of startups
and enterprises from the campuses of our Indian universities to meet and greet
the current and future challenges so as to make India a world leader in
education and research in the coming years.
Prof Sharma said VCs also need also to create in “us” and “our university
community” a sense of pride in our ancient wisdom that once made India a cradle
of globally acclaimed high quality education and human development par
excellence.
“At
the same time we must commit ourselves to reviving the ancient wisdom of practicing
a righteous way of life based on strict compliance to truth, maintaining purity of thoughts and actions, conforming to self-
discipline, unending quest for research and new knowledge creation, but on top
of that a caring concern for the wellbeing of mankind and Mother Nature,
attaining perfection in work activity and conformance to work ethics and
professional morality, discovering the meaning and purpose of life, and living
a live full of divine bliss and happiness in plenty. “
The Indian Universities of Nalanda at Rajgir in Bihar, Takshashila in North West of India,
close to Gandhar at that time and Viramshila
at Ujjain in Central India and later in Bhagalpur in Bihar and the Gurukuls of Sandeepni Ashram at Ujjain, Dronacharya Ashram at Gurugram,
Viswamitra and Bhardwaj Ashrams at Chittrakut
during Mahabharata and Ramayana times were the centers of higher education and
research for cultivation of most advanced
science and technology that created the wonder that was India and brought the
much acclaimed global eminence for its
scholastic and scientific advancements. Scholars from around the world and
seekers of knowledge congregated to these “centers of global excellence” in
India for attaining enlightenment and cultivation of peace and harmony.
These and many more
residential Gurukuls, universities of
ancient India provided education in harmony with nature and inspired the
seekers of knowledge to adhere to the principles of peace, purity and
righteousness as the cardinal principles for leading a dignified human life. The focus here was on integration of
education with values, capabilities with virtues of humility and simplicity to
serve the society and Mother Nature with utmost devotion and unconditional
commitment.
With only 20
Universities and 500 Colleges in the country at the time of independence with
2.1 Lakhs students in higher education, India’s higher education grew by leaps
and bound during the last 70 years, more rapidly in the post globalization era,
1991 onwards.
As per the UGC Annual Report 2015-16, the numbers have increased
to 40 times in the case of the Universities, 100 times in the case of Colleges
and the student enrolment has gone up to 165 times in the formal system of
higher education in comparison to the figures at the time of independence.
As
on 31.03.2016, the number of Universities stood at 799 universities – (47 Central, 75
Institutions of National Importance, 342 State, 198 State Private and 140
Deemed to be Universities) and 39071 colleges and 11923 standalone institutions enrolling 34.6
million students as per the UGC Annual Report 2015—16. So far as the number of universities is
concerned, Rajasthan tops the list with 70 universities, followed by Uttar
Pradesh 70, Tamil Nadu 52, Karnataka 49, Maharashtra 46, Haryana 38, etc.
But numbers alone do not suffice to earn India
its repute in the field of Higher Education in the world. Serious concerns have
been voiced repeatedly for utterly poor employability, acute shortage of well
qualified faculty, lack of culture of research and knowledge creation, poor
connect with industries and for ineffective regulatory system. The system is also least supportive of internationalization. The net
result being that despite significant growth in the enrolment, quality,
relevance and excellence remain as major challenges being faced by India’s
Higher Education system.
I, must however, add
that the way ahead is equally challenging. On one hand the higher education in
India is reeling under the crisis of low employability, on the other hand, it
has a great promise in store for accelerating society and industry relevant
research and innovations, given the innovative and creative potential of the
young India. For this to make a phenomenal success, the higher education system
in India has to align itself to the relevance and excellence that shall make
higher education a powerful vehicle to fuel the growth of startups and new enterprises
in plenty and meet the challenges of higher education of tomorrow driven by
mind boggling advancements on the scientific and technological fronts.
The idea of a university today should revolve around providing a learning
environment that promotes the spirit of enquiry, a sense of commitment to find
solutions to the pressing problems of the society, an unending quest to
discover the truth of being and to unveil the secret of creation and at the
same time engage in pursuits of translating acquired knowledge and capabilities
to create a better tomorrow. It is this idea of a university; we need to
seriously ponder today when education is being seen as a powerful vehicle of
transformation of nation’s economies and wellbeing of the vast humanity.
He said the Restructuring of India’s Higher Education is needed. The FICCI report on
Higher Education in India-Vision 2030 released at the FICCI Higher Education
Summit in 2012 argues that despite the fact that we are on the threshold of
great opportunities to leap frog in quality and excellence “We are in the the 21st century with a mid-20th
Century Regulatory Architecture. During this time we have seen countries like
China, Korea and Singapore, transform from developing to advanced economies in
a decade due to strategic planning and a larger vision that correlated economic
development to transformation in the education sector, in particular higher education and research,
to become globally competitive.”
The need for
Restructuring has been voiced earlier by National Knowledge Commission in its
Report to the Nation 2007. It has identified India’s fat university affiliation
system being totally ineffective to monitor and regulate quality and
recommended that we should delink the undergraduate affiliated courses in the
colleges and set up State Board of UG Studies to relieve the universities from
the bulk of the burden of affiliated colleges.
But then if this
recommendation of the National Knowledge Commission is accepted would it not do
a greater harm than good it aims to achieve. We must not forget that India’s
strength lies in its energetic and innovative and enthusiastic UG students and
thus an exercise of restructuring should find a better solution to harness this
strength than to devoid universities of the inspired innovative minds of Undergraduates
whose potential of creativity and innovativeness if harnessed in right earnest
shall provide a major boom for research, innovations and new
techno-entrepreneurship. May be a better solution lies in granting autonomy to
those colleges which amply deserve on the basis of their track record of strict
adherence of quality standards and record of their maturity and integrity to
utilise the “Autonomy as a Freedom to Excel” and not the “Freedom to Exploit” as is seen in the past in the case of
colleges and some of the universities.
I must add that at a time when the call for developing a new India
of our dream is a national mission of priority,
there should be no room for complacency and mediocrity in the university
system. The leadership of the university holds a great responsibility in this
respect and under no circumstances we, as Vice Chancellors should yield to
misguide on sacrificing merit, performance and standards of quality.
Fellow Vice Chancellors, let this learned
assembly today resolve to foster values and education together in the temples
of learning of the awakened India, namely, the universities and herald a new
era of resurgence of higher education that shall enable Mother India to regain
its global pre-eminence in higher education and research. He said Policy
Interventions for fostering Quality and Relevance are needed:
92nd
Annual Meet of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU) at the Central
Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies, Sarnath, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh.holds a special significance as we are on the thresh hold of major reforms in
higher education system in our country. The New Education Policy is on the
anvil. Let our collective wisdom at this important meet generate the
trajectories of policy interventions to revitalize even redesign the higher
education in India to meet the national and global aspirations.
Fellow Vice
Chancellors, we can no longer blind our eyes from the burning problems faced by
the society, let alone expect someone else to solve these problems. For me, the
universities are the body, mind and soul of the Nation’s intellectual canvas
and are charged with the onerous responsibility to play a leading role in
creating a bright future for the mankind.
We thus need to
effectively tackle the monumental challenge of attracting the best inspired and
creative minds in the faculty and thereafter to provide them the vital
ecosystem to manifest their fullest of potential to develop industry ready,
inspired, creative and enterprising minds of graduates and post graduates from
the campuses of the universities, engage in cutting edge research and
innovations and to roll out startups and new enterprises.
We need therefore,
to seriously ponder on the implementable strategies for our new Education
Policy that shall meet this emergent and highly important need of Faculty
Development and accelerated growth of creativity and relevance in our
universities in India.
We, in India, have a
highly enriched spiritual heritage and are blessed with cultural traditions
that provide a sound basis for cultivation of peace and harmony besides
inspiring us to rise to the altars of humility and human excellence. We must therefore,
effectively blend the wisdom of our antiquity into the modernity of our human
civilization to support the resurgence of India to its global eminence. I call
upon you, the fellow Vice Chancellors, to work for effectively for integrating
education with values and assure highest levels of quality of education,
relevance of research, innovation driven growth of startups and enterprises and
be a great force in supporting the resolve of making a New India, India of our
dream, where education becomes an empowerment
of capabilities, character and commitment to serve the society and the nation
with fullest of dedication and to win back, for India its lost glory of global
eminence in higher education and research in the new knowledge era.
He said Is it not
already late for Indian government to roll out its education policy as four
years of the new government in office are nearly over. Ideally the new
education policy should have been rolled our soon after coining major missions
such "Make in India", "Digital India", "Skill
India" and " Startup India", well intentioned and well thought
missions for a new and resurgent India.
But it should have also been realized that in
the absences of a well-defined and well-articulated education policy, such
novel missions would face the scarcity of talent pool, lack continuous supply
of innovations, easy availability of advanced science and technology and above
all the vital ecosystem to harness creativity and enterprising minds
that are required to make astounding success and create India of our dream.
Perhaps, it is still
not too late, as the committee to draft the New Education Policy headed by
India's eminent Scientist Padam Vibhushan Dr K Kasturirangan is in the process
of finalizing its report. The New Education Policy must come out with a clear
policy framework that shall address the formidable challenge of Quality of
Primary Education and Quality and Relevance of education and research in the
Higher Education sector.
.
Forward and stop not
till the goal of resurgence of India’s Higher Education is fully realized. As
you reach back to your university campuses, let a sea change be seen in your
outlook and approach, let you be seen as a breakthrough leader working with
speed leadership approach.
He urged VCs to
create the vital synergy of minds in universities, cast a renewed collective vision
and draw a strategic plan for your university to make stupendous progress on
Quality of Education, Relevance of research and development, causing
accelerated growth of Innovations and Technology Incubation giving rise to
startups in plenty and make your university a powerful vehicle of
transformation of regional and national development.
Comments
Post a Comment