The present IIM Bill under consideration by the Government to be passed as an Act of Parliament has as its hallmark the autonomy to IIMs for all aspects except selection of its directors and governing Board members. It is reported that the Government’s final view on this was that to meet the objectives of the IIMs this Bill needs to be liberal in outlook and a must if the IIMs are to leap-frog to the next stage. After this Bill is passed, IIMs will be able to grant MBA and PhD degrees instead of PGDM and fellow certificates, respectively. This is a wonderful initiative by the government.
In contrast, the non-government institutions offering PGDM and fellow certificates are regulated by AICTE which in its 2010 notification mandated that for these institutions the fees, curriculum, admissions, etc. will be decided/ approved by AICTE or a relevant government body. This notification was challenged collectively by these institutions then and is before the Supreme Court awaiting a final decision. Every year since then an extension of status-quo prevailing prior to this 2010 notification of AICTE is granted by the SC for these non-government institutions to commence activities for the next academic year.
The first IIT in India was set up at Kharagpur in 1951 and there are now 16 IITs. The first IIM was set up at Calcutta (now Kolkata) in 1961 and there are 19 IIMs in place now. All IITs and IIMs have been set up outside the university system with their own Board of Governors (BoG). It is easy to speculate that for these newage institutions the Government must have wanted to give them nimbleness in decision-making as well as independence from over regulations to be able to perform as desired. These aspects must not have been considered achievable in the university system or under AICTE regulations. Thus, the inability of the university system in India to foster world class institutions was side stepped.
While the IITs had the authority to grant degrees, the IIMs could not as they were registered as societies, and as a result IIMs could give only in PGDM that was given equivalence to an MBA degree by the Association of Indian Universities (AIU) a non-constitutional body. Thus, began the way of higher education in India with three different governing models, the universities under UGC, IITs through the IIT Acts and the IIMs on their own as registered societies. This kind of multiple academic governance and the associated degree/PGDM granting systems do not exist anywhere in the developed world.
It must, however, be noted that higher education is an option to pursue for career growth by an individual, unlike elementary education that may be considered essential for a decent survival. The institutions must keep developing and reinventing itself considering sweeping changes in ways technology is changing and the way technology is being deployed to harness resources available and people’s capabilities.
To meet the huge demand for education facing India, private sector participation in higher education must not only be encouraged, but rather be incentivised. It is crucial that the Government as well as the private institutions must co-exist. The Government must encourage private investment in higher education and also recognise the necessity of the financial autonomy for the private institutions. Among many possibilities of incentivising private funding, if only a tax rebate incentive is given to private funding for not-for-profit education institutions, the government would be able to mobilise about three times the money it has forgone as tax revenue, into the education system. A policy for privately funded university/institution with the kind of regulatory freedom similar to as enjoyed by the IITs and the IIMs has the potential to produce dozens of world class universities/institutions in about 10 years.
The writer is Dr Jitendra K Das, director, Fore School of Management, New Delhi