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TNN 6 August 2009, 10:34pm IST
VARANASI: The BHU vice-chancellor Prof DP Singh addressed the faculty members on the beginning of new academic session on Thursday.
He said that the Executive Council of the University has approved the upgradation of IT-BHU as IIT-BHU. Although the upgraded institute will be integrated with the IIT system in the country, yet it will continue to have its linkages with BHU in its academic and administrative governance.
He said significant developments have also taken place in the matter of the establishment of a UNESCO Chair on Peace Education and Inter Cultural Understanding. The School of Nursing has been upgraded to a College of Nursing to run courses at the under-graduate and post-graduate levels. Establishment of an Inter-disciplinary School of Life Sciences is also proposed in the university with the support of the Department of Bio-Technology, Government of India.
He further stated that efforts are being made to get a special grant of Rs 100 crore through the Planning Commission for overall development of South Campus. The
School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi has been engaged to prepare a master plan for development of the campus so that it could be designed and developed aesthetically, beautifully as well as scientifically. He said that BHU must have its own policy on quality. Efforts are under way to formulate this policy for the university, which should guide to have an appropriate action plan and teaching-learning environment for value based education and administration.
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http://www.telegraphindia.com/1090720/jsp/nation/story_11258574.jsp
CHARU SUDAN KASTURI
New Delhi, July 19: The human resource development ministry plans to shoot from the law ministry’s shoulders to scuttle demands placed by the Banaras Hindu University in exchange for losing its engineering wing.
Caught between political pressures and these demands, which it considers unreasonable, the HRD ministry is relying on the law to persuade the BHU to snap its ties with its engineering wing for its promised conversion into an IIT.
The BHU wants its Institute of Technology (IT-BHU) to remain an integral part of the university, a demand the HRD ministry is placing before the law ministry, senior officials told The Telegraph.
“Hopefully, if the law ministry concurs with us, our hands will be strengthened in convincing the BHU that its demand is unreasonable,” a senior HRD ministry official said.
IT-BHU students post-2006 argue that they joined the institute because of the promise to convert it into an IIT. But the BHU community is split, with several members opposed to losing the engineering wing, which is today the university’s most sought after department.
Under the IIT Act, which governs India’s premier engineering schools, IITs need to be independent institutions and cannot be structurally conjoined to any other institution or university.
Towards the end of its first term, the UPA government had shelved the IT-BHU conversion plan and focused on starting eight new IITs. With the new institutes now launched, the HRD ministry is under pressure to take another look at the IT-BHU conversion promise.
Failure to meet the assurance by the 2012 Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls may prove embarrassing for the Congress-led government, but HRD ministry officials are up against conditions set by the BHU that they find unacceptable.
The BHU executive council has resolved that while it supports the conversion plan, it wants the new institute named IIT-BHU and not IIT Banaras as it would normally have been named.
It also wants the BHU vice-chancellor appointed chairman of the converted IIT’s board of governors so it can retain control over the institute’s policies.
IT-BHU had first been picked with six other institutions, including the Bengal Engineering and Science University (Besu), during the NDA’s rule for conversion into IITs.
But an expert panel said IT-BHU alone deserved the tag and recommended a new category — Indian Institute of Engineering, Science and Technology — for Besu and the Cochin University for Science and Technology. Later, the UPA repeated the promise to IT-BHU.
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http://www.telegraphindia.com/1090731/jsp/nation/story_11304010.jsp
CHARU SUDAN KASTURI
New Delhi, July 30: Banaras Hindu University’s engineering wing can retain the name of its parent varsity even after being cleaved into an independent IIT, the Centre has accepted, clearing a major roadblock in the execution of a long-promised upgrade.
The university, too, has withdrawn its demand that the vice-chancellor (VC) be permanently made chairman of the new IIT in a compromise that has revived efforts to elevate the status of the Institute of Technology-BHU.
The human resource development and the law ministries have agreed to name the upgraded institute IIT-BHU — unlike any other of India’s 15 IITs — instead of IIT Varanasi as they initially wanted, The Telegraph has learnt.
Two days after the law ministry approved IIT-BHU as the name of the new institute on July 14, the executive council of the university met and accepted a set of demands by the HRD ministry. Government officials confirmed there was still a slight divergence between the HRD ministry and the university over a key government demand. But with each conceding ground from their earlier positions, the university and the Centre have broken the deadlock, sources said.
“The compromise is significant because the plans for the upgrade of IT-BHU into an IIT were appearing bleaker with every passing day. Now it is a question of when, not whether,” an official said.
IT-BHU, which for years has admitted students through the IIT Joint Entrance Examination, was first promised the IIT status, along with six other institutes, during NDA rule. An expert panel subsequently proposed that IT-BHU be granted the IIT tag.
In 2008, the HRD ministry announced it would start eight new IITs and upgrade IT-BHU into an IIT under the current Eleventh Five-Year Plan. Earlier this year, the move to upgrade IT-BHU was temporarily shelved ahead of the polls.
At the IIT council meeting in January, concerns were raised about separating IT-BHU from its parent varsity. The concerns were later echoed by others at BHU.
In February, the university’s executive council passed a resolution agreeing to the upgrade of IT-BHU but placed a set of conditions the Centre has till now found unacceptable. The demands that the newly created institute should be called IIT-BHU and that the university’s VC be made chairman of the board of governors of the new IIT were considered the most controversial.
IITs, by definition, were required to have an independent existence, and a name tying the new institution to an existing one was unacceptable, ministry officials had argued. While they have now accepted IIT-BHU as the new name, the university council has agreed to withdraw a proposal that a new institute be built at its Mirzapur campus.
BHU has also agreed that its vice-chancellor need not be made de-facto chairman of the new IIT. But it is still demanding that the VC be made co-chairman, a request the Centre is unwilling to accept.
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TNN 17 July 2009, 10:19pm IST
VARANASI: The executive council of Banaras Hindu University (BHU) approved the proposal for IIT status to the Institute of Technology (IT) at its meeting held on Thursday.
According to the university spokesperson, it was approved that the BHU would have its representation in the proposed IIT-BHU's executive council and academic council. The BHU vice-chancellor would be the co-chairman in the governing body. It may be mentioned here that the students of IT-BHU have been raising the demand for IIT status for a long time.
The EC also approved the appointment of Prof BB Bansal of mechanical engineering department as the director of UGC Academic Staff College. Besides, 23 appointments through direct recruitment and 36 appointments through promotion were also approved by the EC. The meeting was attended by V-C Prof DP Singh, Major General SN Mukherjee, Prof Kamal Singh, Prof S Churamani Gopal, Prof DS Rathore, Prof Laxman Chaturvedi and Prof SB Singh.
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We are pleased to publish two scholarly articles writer by Editor of The Statesman, Kolkata. The articles describes higher education scenario in India and the steps the govt. should take to improve it. We hope our readers will enjoy the articles.
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http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=3&theme=&usrsess=1&id=261412
In search of learning
THOUGHTS have grown in wild profusion on the various facets and issues relating to higher education in India. Not all of them are necessarily consistent; they are even contradictory and can turn out to be misleading.
The Knowledge Commission was expected to give a sense of direction, but it turned out to be a house divided. Its vice-chairman and some members resigned. Its functioning was on occasion opposed by the HRD ministry. A new minister has now taken over. Will he be able to steer clear of contradictions and provide positive leadership to ensure the progress of higher education? This presupposes a clear ideological outlook.
An overriding ideology now influences our economy, polity, technology, society and culture. This is the ideology of marketisation, globalisation, privatisation and liberalisation. It also tends to influence our educational system.
The ideology of marketisation has led to the “commodification” of everything. Education is one such “commodity” to be bought and sold in the market. An educational institution is the shop where “education” is bought and sold. The type of instruction imparted and its “quality” depends on the demand and supply in the market.
This concept of education is a far cry from the classical liberal ideas of education in Europe as also from our own ancient traditions. Cardinal Newman in spelling out the goal of universal education observed that it should produce a “gentleman” with good judgment regarding right and wrong. More recently, Edward Dabono stated that education should produce a thinking individual. In the scintillating convocation address to Allahabad University, delivered in 1948, Jawaharlal Nehru said, “A university stands for humanism, for tolerance, for adventure of ideas, for secret of truth, for the onward march of the human race towards ever-lasting goals of life.”
No guarantee
IN today’s system of higher education in India, we seem to have ignored such ideas and concepts. Young people generally opt for courses that will ensure a rewarding career. Money is the ultimate determinant. In taking up such courses, students pay scant attention to their own likes and dislikes, their inclinations and capabilities. Till recently, medicine and engineering were the top courses in demand. A medical course is now considered to be expensive and prolonged, with no guarantee of an immediate payback. Because it takes time to settle down as a doctor, more and more students are going in for computer engineering, information technology, management, animation and gaming. These subjects ensure remunerative jobs on graduation.
No wonder the traditional arts and science courses have no takers. Students do not want to go in for pure sciences and mathematics. A leading scientist, CNR Rao, has drawn attention to this phenomenon. He has warned that if this goes on, there will be no “science teachers”. This can lead to disastrous consequences not least because science is the foundation of technology and without a sound foundation of science no country can progress. Scientific research can come to a standstill.
Likewise, the neglect of the liberal arts such as literature, philosophy, and history can lead to lopsided education and an unbalanced society. The Yashpal Committee has recommended an inter-disciplinary approach to higher education even in such technological institutions as the IIT.
There is a cut-throat competition for the limited number of seats available in the IITs and IIMs and similar institutions. Under the pressure of competition, students are more anxious to clear examinations with a high rank rather than acquire knowledge and skills. Not to mention acquiring knowledge for it’s own sake and the depth of understanding it provides. Students even spend a fair amount in the coaching classes which prepare students for competitive examinations. While coaching classes are full, classrooms in colleges are deserted.
The liberal outlook has given way to a purely utilitarian and commercial one. Education is looked upon as an instrument of producing human resources needed by the economy. Educated and trained human resources have become a scarce commodity specially in the context of demographic changes in the advanced countries like Japan and Germany and other European countries where gerontocracy prevails. Young human resources are in short supply. This has put India with its young profile (50 per cent of the people less than 25 years) in an advantageous position.
India can be the factory to churn out human resources for the rest of the world. It is in this context that the Knowledge Commission has called for a drastic increase in the institutions of higher education such as IITs, IIMs, and universities. India needs a minimum of 1500 universities, according to Mr Sam Pitroda, the chairman of the Knowledge Commission. Following the recommendations, the Centre announced the setting up of 30 new Central universities and several new IITs and IIMs.
But there can be no mushroom growth of the institutions of higher education. They not only require substantial financial resources for infrastructure, but also a high calibre faculty which is not readily available. If institutions are hurriedly set up, they will remain below par. This is one of the drawbacks of India’s system of higher education. Quality is sacrificed at the altar of quantity A special report on India (The Economist ~ 13-19 December 2008, China and India ~ a tale of two vulnerable economics) states ~ “The quality of teaching in India’s 248 universities and some 18,000 colleges is generally poor. NASSCOM the IT Industry’s lobby group reckons that out of 30,000 engineering graduates who emerge each year mostly from private college, 25 per cent are unemployable without extensive further training and half are just unemployable... In a recent ranking of world’s 500 best universities by Shanghai Jiao Tong University, only two were from India.”
Under the pressure of demand, a rapid growth of these institutions has become a necessity. An enormous number of young people with high aspirations can be an asset to India if they can be given knowledge and skills required in the modern economy and society governed by modern technology like that of internet. If the number of institutions of higher education is insufficient, the youth will remain unemployable and get frustrated. Rather than being an asset, they will be a liability, posing grave danger to society.
Changed outlook
THOSE belonging to affluent sections seek admission to universities in the USA, Germany and Australia. It is estimated that their number is about 3.5 million and they spend $13 billion on pursuing education abroad. It is, therefore, rightly argued that this amount could be invested within the country to set up quality institutions of higher learning.
The number of institutions of higher education required to be set up is so large that they cannot be set up by the government alone. They will have to come up in the private sector. Such institutions are not unknown in India. During British rule, Lokmanya Tilak and Lala Lajpat Rai took the lead in setting up such institutions. Their outlook was essentially nationalistic. They were educationists. They wanted qualified Indians with a patriotic spirit.
That outlook has changed. The profit motive is the major determinant. There are non-aided institutions that receive government assistance in the form of concessions. These private institutions lack infrastructure and a faculty worth the name. And yet the government cannot take corrective action because of their political connections and support. They have grown from strength to strength making the educational enterprise a flourishing business. Rather than being affiliated to established universities, they have successfully claimed the status of deemed universities.
The previous HRD minister was liberal in according the status of regular universities to institutions previously known as deemed universities. Their number has gone up to 125. The new HRD minister, Mr Kapil Sibal, intends to examine whether the status of such institutions is justified. Our private universities are a far cry from the world-renowned private institutions in the USA.
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http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=16&theme=&usrsess=1&id=261481
A mammoth undertaking
The tasks before the new HRD
minister are infinitely more difficult to achieve than they appear, writes Ardhendu Chatterjee
THE reform-minded human resource development minister Kapil Sibal has a daunting task ahead. True, he has initiated sweeping reforms in education, but to implement them in the right spirit he must undo some of the damage to higher education done by his predecessors. Cleansing the Augean stables of opportunism and putting an end to the bending and flouting of rules and norms for political expediency in granting recognition to new universities — full-fledged or deemed — and appointing favourites to key posts are integral to the success of the new measures.
Divergent opinions have emerged as to whether the formation of a single seven-member Commission of Higher Education and Research replacing the UGC, AICTE, NCTE and Dec, as recommended by the Yash Pal Committee, would be the answer to the problems plaguing higher education. But there is unanimity about the fact that what Sibal needs to do first is to stem the rot that has set in and not to indulge in witch-hunting. For instance, he should send a strong signal to the 125-odd deemed universities to conform to UGC-prescribed norms regarding infrastructure, admissions, duration of courses, conduct of exams, question patterns, assessments etc, within a certain time frame. If they fulfill all the criteria, they should not be denied university status.
Sibal’s second most important task is to make the 14 upcoming universities, the seven IIMs and eight new IITs — not to forget Banaras Hindu University’s Institute of Technology — into world class institutions. The target might seem a tad too unrealistic given the state of India’s higher education today. Consider, for example, the latest Asian rankings of Indian universities conducted by QS that compiled the Times Higher Education-QS World University Rankings. Is it not shocking that out of the 350-odd Indian universities only seven could make to the list of top-100 universities in Asia? More shocking is the position of the five IIT’s — India’s islands of excellence — included in the list: IIT-Bombay (30th), IIT-Kanpur (34th), IIT-Delhi (36th), IIT-Madras (49th), and IIT-Roorkee (63rd). Incidentally, Delhi University and Pune University are the only two general universities in the reckoning, their rankings being 60th and 100th respectively. Given this sultry scenario, far-flung objectives are likely to end in desperation.
The only silver lining is that the human resources department has now got someone like Kapil Sibal with a bit of oomph raising our expectations. To make the new universities and institutes truly world class the minister must take an uncompromising stand in respect of selection of vice-chancellors, key university officials and academic staff. Cutting-edge infrastructure comparable to the best in the world, regular guest lectures by distinguished scientists, researchers and Nobel laureates, opportunities for research of the highest standard and institution of awards for excellence could take higher education beyond the “narrow domestic walls” it is enclosed in. Admission of students strictly on the basis of merit through an all-India written test, reservation of seats for overseas students, scholarship for the poor but promising can also turn out to be similarly conducive to proper intellectual exploration.
India, according to the National Knowledge Commission, “needs 1,500 universities to attain a gross enrolment ratio of at least 15 per cent by 2015” because only seven per cent of the population in the 18-24 age group has access to higher education. It is a mammoth undertaking, and although higher education has got 40 billion more in this year’s budget, another important task before Sibal will be to create necessary resources.
Having set up 1,250 universities during the last three years, China has disproved the myth that more universities dilute academic standards. The NKC, too, has pointed out that “we need to create more appropriately scaled and more nimble universities. The moral of the story is that we need not only a much larger number of universities… but also smaller universities which are responsive to change and easier to manage.”
Sibal has rightly told the American undersecretary of states William Burns that no run-of-the-mill type or fly-by-night US institutions would be allowed to operate in India: if their best institutes want to set up shop here, they are welcome. The need of the hour is to arrest the exodus of Indian students to countries like the USA, UK, Australia and Canada for higher studies.
The writer is senior lecturer in English, Durgapur Institute of Advanced Technology and Management, Rajbandh.
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We are pleased to publish this report as the first one in our Travelogue section. The report is forwarded by Milan Bikram Shah from Kathmandu, Nepal, where he lives. We hope these photos taken around the lake Mansarovar will be enjoyed by our readers.
We also request our readers to send us their travel experience and photographs from the different parts of the world for publishing. Please send your articles at; chronicle@itbhuglobal.org
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About Milan Bikram Shah
He did his Chemical Engineering in 1974 from IT-BHU, Varanasi. He was CEO of National Trading Limited and Prior to his current self-retirement in 2008 he was CEO of his parent company Nepal Industrial Development Corporation, where he started work as Engineer in 1975 and finally as CEO of NIDC.
He can be contacted at: rajamilan@gmail.com
His profile can be viewed at LinkedIn.
http://www.linkedin.com/pub/milan-bikram-shah/9/200/936
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Himalayan Panoramas as seen from Tibet
Photos were taken in June this year while traveling 900 kms by road from Kathmandu to Mt Kailash on the Tibetan side of the Himalayas. This travel took four days and we were very fortunate in many ways, such as to have the best of weathers all along, and to have a driver who would patiently stop the vehicle for us to take photos whenever we wanted, although we were a part of 101 pilgrims traveling together in a convoy of 26 vehicles!! Here is a glimpse of some of the most magnificent scenes that was seen.
1) This mountain was glowing in the early morning sun.
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2) The mountain range with snow contrasted beautifully against the barren hills and desert which had their own colours.
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3) This peak on the left of this range is over 26000’ above the sea and is called “Shisha Pangma”. This same range takes on a different appearance as we go forward and closer as seen below.
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4) This lake Pugotzu, at an elevation of about 16000’ above the sea.
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5) This is another lake which was perfectly still, reflecting the colourful mountains behind!!
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6) Many of these lakes are of saltish water. Only Mansarovar has sweet water.
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7) The mountain on the left is called Gurla Mahandhata, whose snow melt feeds the Mansarovar seen on the right.
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8) This breathtaking scene emerges as our car climbed over a ridge and then started traveling down into the base of this range.
Our heart overflows with gratitude to Lord Shiva and our Great Gurus for this very special blessing they bestowed on us.
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Institute of Technology, Banaras Hindu University
Varanasi 221005, UP