Indian engg graduates prefer foreign shores for doctorates

NEW DELHI: Most Indian institutions, including the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Science (IIScs) have failed to effectively evolve from under-graduate teaching institutions to research centres.

A large number of engineering graduates either take up jobs after their BTech or go the United States for higher education, found a study conducted by IIT Mumbai professors Rangan Banerjee and Vinayak P Muley of the department of energy science and engineering.

Indians accounted for about 10% of science and engineering PhDs awarded in the US between 1998 to 2001, with biomedical engineering (16.3%), aerospace (12.8%) and computers (7.7%) the most popular subjects, a study called Engineering Education in India said.

The study, funded by Observer Research Foundation, found that despite producing about 2.37 lakh engineering grads each year, India’s doctorates were less than 1% of its graduate degrees. Top institutes like IITs and IIScs contributed less than 1% of the engineering grads, 20% of the MTechs and 40% of PhDs. A majority of these
graduates pass out from the National Institutes of Technology (3%), state engineering colleges and private engineering colleges (75%).

However, all engineering institutes put together, the annual number of engineering PhDs is less than 1,000 (1%).

The vast majority of private colleges affiliated to universities also put up a poor show when it came to quality faculty and infrastructure. They were also constrained by a lack of academic and financial flexibility, the study found. It added that while most Indian institutions were improving their research output they were still far behind the best international institutions. Hence, the engineering education system in India has been unable to attract the best engineering students for post-graduate studies.

At present, the IITs are unable to attract their best engineering graduates and postgraduates for their doctoral theses — only 1% of the graduating BTech class of an IIT opts for an MTech and only 2% of the graduating MTech class opts for a PhD.

With the faculty base almost stagnant, the challenge for the IIT system is to enhance its overall output and impact the engineering education system, the study recommended.
Interestingly, in the US more than a third of all PhD degrees in science and engineering and almost half of all doctorates in mathematics and computer science are awarded to non-US students, with Indians accounting for 10% of science and engineering doctorates.

“There are other factors too. There is a general perception that research opportunities and facilities in US are the best. Students also manage well-paying fellowships and are easily absorbed by the industry which is not the case in India. Doing a PhD is seen as time consuming and usually students want to take up a job right after their degree,” said Prof Rangan Banerjee.

This despite average PhD students drawing about 37% higher compared to simple BTech students. In general, IIT grads do not opt for MTech or PhD at IIT as almost all IIT graduates get jobs before they actually get their degrees.

The study, a copy of which has been sent to the Planning Commission, recommends launching a national PhD Initiative comprising fellowships of Rs20,000-25,000 pm, industry support for 5,000 fellowships a year, a steering committee with representatives from industry, government and academics, a high visibility publicity  and initiative to encourage sponsored PhD students from industry, defence laboratories, CSIR institutions as external or full time students in Tier-1 institutions like IITs and IIScs.
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