Letter from the Editor

The 150th anniversary year of India’s first three modern universities established in Calcutta (now Kolkata), Bombay (Mumbai) and Madras (Chennai) in 1857, was meant to be a prolonged season of celebration. The vice-chancellors of most of India’s major universities, including the three pioneer institutions, had concluded a series of conferences in which they had presented detailed papers to UGC (University Grants Commission) and the Planning Commission on ways and means to get the country’s 352 universities, 18,000 colleges and the languishing higher education system in general, up and running smoothly again. But in the culminating round of the conferences held in Delhi on October 10, Union human resource development minister Arjun Singh pooped the party by describing the country’s tertiary education system as "the sick child of Indian education".

Although not inaccurate — a NASSCOM-McKinsey & Co study (2005) says that 75 percent of the graduates of the country’s 1,346 engineering colleges are unemployable, and that only 10 percent of the graduates of government run arts, science and commerce colleges are industry ready — this disparaging remark has caused considerable anguish and heartburn within Indian academia. Not the least because this pejorative judgement was delivered by an individual who in his two innings as Union HRD minister has done more to shape post-independence India’s moribund higher education system floundering in a sea of troubles, than any vice-chancellor past or present — a classic case of pot calling the kettle black.

Nevertheless there’s no denying that hobbled by inadequate capacity, obsolete syllabuses, rock-bottom tuition fees, poorly trained, demoralised faculty, government regulation of admissions and fees, and lumbered with complex affirmative action quotas, India’s public as well as private universities, colleges and institutions of tertiary education are ICU (intensive care unit) cases. In this month’s cover story there’s a diagnosis of the root causes of the debilitating epidemic afflicting tertiary education, and the outlines of a strategy to revive the country’s institutions of higher education, failing which the present promise of India emerging as a major provider of high quality goods and services in the rapidly crystallising global market, is likely to prove an illusion.

And in the special report feature, our indefatigable assistant editor Summiya Yasmeen provides a flashback of the education highlights of EducationWorld’s eighth anniversary year, which we celebrated last month. Moreover, check out our newly introduced EW Kidzone pages designed to help parents of young children facilitate their smooth entry into the world of learning and discovery, and provide feedback. We want to double our Mailbox page to make EW more interactive. Brickbats are as welcome — well almost — as bouquets.

Meanwhile from all of us in EducationWorld, Merry Xmas and Happy New Year!

Dilip Thakore