The Group of Ministers has recommended an allocation of Rs 8,000 cr for higher education to increase the number of seats, but there’s an acute shortage of faculty in most institutions.
NEW DELHI: A day after getting the nod from the government on quota, the HRD ministry has got down to work. The draft of the previous legislation is being reworked to add the 27 per cent figure in the Bill. A ministry official indicated that with increase in the total number of seats, seats for SC and STs would also rise proportionately.
The ministry is jubilant over its victory over the quota issue and over the fact that it has managed to garner Rs 8,000 crore for higher education. The present budget allocation for higher education and universities is Rs 2,774 crore, while that of technical education is Rs 1718.40 crores. Of this, government-dependent IITs get Rs 683 crores and self-sufficient IIMs get Rs 65 crores.
"We have been pleading before the Planning Commission and Finance Ministry to allocate more funds for higher and technical education. With the pressure to increase seats we will have to create more infrastructure and campuses," said an official.
IITs say they would not require much time and money to create infrastructure. "For instance, in IIT Kharagpur, we had already planned to increase seats and create infrastructure over the next five years," said SK Dube, Director, IIT-Kharagpur. But infrastructure is not the only issue. With teachers quitting from the government-run Centres of Excellence for better pay packages and opportunities, the teacher-pupil ratio is already skewed. Now, with plans to increase the number of seats, the ratio will be further affected, say academicians.
In the country's top medical institutions, each professor has three to four post-graduate students under him or her. The number should ideally be two. At the IIMs, the student-teacher ratio is 8:1 and at IITs it's 12:1.
"Two years ago, radiology and psychiatry were de-recognised in Lady Harding Medical College (LHMC), because of staff shortage. Now, they are talking about increasing the number of seats," says Dr Murli Abhishek of LHMC. "Faculty recruitment is one of the biggest problems that IITs are facing. In the directors' meeting, it was discussed how to attract more teachers. For this, it was also proposed to provide teachers with more research facilities and attractive packages through some other sources," said Col Rajender Singh, registrar of IIT Delhi.
The senior-most professor in IIT gets a package of Rs 40,000 per month, which after deductions comes to Rs 23,000. The situation is similar for central university professors and medical college faculty. A large number of IIT and medical teachers are joining corporate houses and private hospitals for lucrative pay-packages.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}