Education shouldn't be a profit-earning business: Chidambaram

Union home minister P Chidambaram today said that private participation in higher education was important for the spread of education, but not at the cost of using the sector for profiteering.

"I believe that private participation in higher education is important for the spreading of education, but I am strictly against private business with education," Chidambaram said at the closing ceremony, marking 150 years of St Xavier's College here.

"In fact, today's education has either become a money-spinning machine or a moth-eaten system, but we need to change that, and make higher education available to all," the home minister said in the Convocation and Valedictory Programme, 2010.

"Education should be left away from business and there should be no profit from education," he said.

The Central government had laid down the higher education policy, and higher education was a domain where there was no place for profiteers, the home minister said.

In fact, according to the home minister, it was not only school education, but higher education which was essential for the development of the nation, and in this sphere the country lags far behind international standards.

"When all over the globe, 40% of the school-going students make it to colleges or universities, in India only 11 to 12% of the students make it to the higher education section. This should be changed," he said.

Chidambaram conferred Nihil Ultra Award of Honour to Rev Father PC Mathew SJ, principal of the St Xavier's College.