Fresh ideas, not more institutions
Problems of higher education in India and changes required are:
1. Indian Universities seldom make an appearance in International rankings whereas Asian universities which are only two decades old are making into the top rankings.
Further in Indian Universities there is no scope for knowledge creation and serious research and scholarship.
Effecting transformation involves five things:
- substantial resources,
- a progressive regulatory environment in which higher education regulators begin to trust universities
- a new governance model for creating opportunities and space for research and scholarship
- an enabling environment within universities that will significantly incentivise research and publications
- an attitudinal change among all stakeholders in the higher education sector
Mindless expansion
With its focus on expanding the higher education sector and increasing the Gross Enrollment Ratio there has been mindless expansion leading to:
1. Mediocrity
2. Well funded Central institutes having inadequate faculty
3. State Universities having neither the resources nor the faculty
To tackle this government needs to:
1. fill the faculty positions in a time bound manner
2. Tactful engagement with the institutions and a creative approach to faculty recruitment.
3. Archaic policies that have outlived their time should be dispensed with while recruiting faculty.
While all this is done no more new IITs or IIMs
Lack of Knowledge creation and Research
Here also focus has been on building laboratories and knowledge parks, promoting an industry-academia interface and pursuing research grants and creating incubators.
1. There is a need to start a culture of research instead.
2. focus on a set of specific goals
3. Having a select of institutions both from private and public to represent the best and they should be enhanced in terms of their research capacities so as to serve as role model to future universities.
Lack of collaborations
New ideas and perspectives can be developed only when there is collaboration among universities and faculty. But such collaborations are missing because of:
1. biases and prejudices that have led to skepticism
2. bureaucratic approach of university managements and regulators has led to the creation of too many hurdles in the pursuit of any meaningful collaboration
So following things need to be done:
1. Existing policies relating to research collaborations both within and outside India need to be re-examined and made more progressive and inclusive
2. ensuring greater autonomy and freedom to universities to determine who they want to collaborate with and what the terms of collaboration should be
3. remove the distinctions that exist in relation to public and private universities; instead, universities ought to be differentiated on the basis of their performance and contribution
Innovation
1. The biggest challenge is to create an enabling environment to promote innovation.
2. Archaic rules and regulations that are constantly flouted have given rise to opportunities to dubious institutions to be engaged in corruption.
3. There is a need to seek a change in the attitude of government departments that are involved in policymaking, and regulatory bodies that are monitoring and ensuring standards in higher education.
4. The deep distrust that is prevalent among the institutions on the one hand and the government and regulatory bodies on the other has made the higher education sector static. There is little effort in seeking innovation. This has to change, and quickly.
Today is the third International Domestic Workers’ Day. In India, official figures show that there are 4.75 million domestic workers, out of whom three million are women in urban areas. These are contentious figures; perhaps a grave underrepresentation. The actual number is probably closer to 90 million.
Domestic workers face following issues:
1. Caste factor
the division of tasks and even the hiring of workers is based on their caste and even their religion. The veiled practices of untouchability by employers perpetuate caste and the stigma associated with caste-based labour.
2. Propagating prejudices
State machinery and agencies very often embody similar prejudices but in more subtle forms. For example, the association of domestic workers as a group linked with crimes.
3. Violence
Ministry of Women and Child Development shared statistics of a report, “Violence against Maid Servants,” according to which violence against women workers has shown an increase from 3,422 cases in 2010 to 3,564 in 2012.
Solutions
1. Acknowledge home as a workplace of domestic worker just as our workplace
2. A set of measures to protect workers at their place of work is a great beginning, but the larger objective should be to empower workers to have a sense of entitlement and claims over their site of work just like many of us at our respective formal workplaces do.
A National Policy for Domestic Workers was drafted by the Ministry of Labour and Employment that addresses the issue of discrimination in the workplace and in various other domains. However, the process of addressing some of these issues has to be far more comprehensive than what the policy seems to offer.
1. The policy does not engage with the complex and more prevalent forms of discrimination, like police verification or any effort to counterbalance the same.
2. Also, while suggestions to build “common facilities” like toilet and rest area might seem progressive, what they do is to institutionalise the separateness of the domestic worker.
3. The policy’s repeated reference to workers’ right to “work with dignity and respect” as citizens of India, naturally makes one expect that the policy will make their long due claim over dignity and respect, substantive and not merely rhetorical, but it cannot succeed without targeting the biases against workers that have prevailed for so long.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed to nurture bilateral relations with Bhutan, which he described as “B2B — Bharat to Bhutan,” as he met his counterpart, Tshering Tobgay, and King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuk here on Sunday.
He specified areas such as peace, security, development and tourism to push bilateral ties.
Earlier, Mr. Modi inaugurated the Supreme Court complex built here by India. He announced doubling of scholarships being provided to Bhutanese students in India to Rs. 2 crore, and promised to assist Bhutan in setting up a digital library.
Even as the United States prepares to withdraw most of its combat troops from Afghanistan, a new United Nations report has warned that the Taliban insurgency is flush with funds, and added that the past year has been a bumper year for Taliban revenues, boosted by :
1. booming narcotics income,
2. revenue from corruption and extortion, and
3. increasingly drawing on revenue from the illegal exploitation of natural resources
Nice write up...thx
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