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It is generally acclaimed that, In India, software engineers, civil, electronic & telecommunication engineers,, chemical engineers, doctors and Managers are admired world wide, but mostly for their education in under graduate level. Our Country has not yet established a comparable Goodwill for its graduate studies (or) for eminence in research. Mainly the failure is due to the absence of large scale massive improvements in the World Class Higher educational institutions and systems in the country. In Arts and Humanities the situation is worse since there are no flagship Universities. (At one time, Calcutta University played that role, but no longer, Jawaharlal University ever bothered to assume to assume that responsibility by deliberately opting out of traditional department structure and electing instead to have interred disciplinary centres). Thus resistance to change has become a contagion in Indian higher learning institutions.

Further more, the challenges ahead in higher education is concerned with infrastructure, instruction and learning ensuring the effectiveness, efficiency of teachers, strengthening colleges as deemed universities, preparing diverse population for the future and gaining a better understanding of the changing societal context and what that means for individuals in terms of employability and Nation building. Hence one look into the 21st century; there are many challenges to be faced in the field of higher education that will determine.

“What the youth will learn and how they will learn”; This paper attempts to discuss the challenges and prospects for building a world class higher educational institutions in India. It is in this context, I wish to highlight some of the challenges which the institutions have been facing.
I. How India can organize the four basic inputs of a world class institution namely – Faculty, students, finance and autonomy all at international standards.
II. Threat of foreign universities in higher education scenario.

INTRODUCTION
In the context of Higher education, institutions of higher learning perform three types of functions. My argument is that, in the lower level, they teach & impart knowledge derived from the past to a new gang of students. In the middle level, they critically appraise past knowledge and refine its essence; they write text books. In the top level, they expand the frontiers of knowledge mostly by diminutive analysis; they do basic research. A few of them make breakthroughs, open new vistas of knowledge not known before or create knowledge revolutions, leading at times, to new kinds of industry &corporate undertakings.

Although there has been steady growth in higher education, We may describe a World-Class higher educational institution as one that supports teaching and research, preferably over a wide range of faculties ranging from fine arts and humanities to science and technology; has the freedom to decide originally what to teach, who will teach and whom to teach; attracts students and faculty from all over the world, and earns international honours like the Nobel Prize. It will also have a vigorous undergraduate programme. It goes without saying that, it will be a privileged institution; yet large enough to support enough scholars in each Department to encourage and challenge one another. It will be so capable that it can keep its doors open to brilliant but poor students. In other words, no institution can become a world class institution unless it enjoys the following:
• Dedicated, committed & smart students
• Internationally acclaimed& devoted faculty
• International level financial support
• Complete academic freedom

PRESENT TRENDS IN HIGHER EDUCATION SCENARIO-
ISSUES & CHALLENGES:

For the present discussion, we may think about the institutions a small amount below the world’s most famous, which may be called merely World Class Universities (WCU) because their research output do not compare with the very best. These universities teach well, write text books occasionally, and publish scholarly papers in referred journals etc. How ever, In arts & humanities, the situation is of inferior quality because there are no Flagship Universities. (At one time, University of Calcutta played that role, but no longer. Jawaharlal Nehru University never bothered to assume that responsibility by deliberately opting out of the traditional department structure and electing instead to have inter-disciplinary centres.) Traditional universities are also cramped by outdated university managements and are held back by teacher-politicians. Fifty years ago, India opted for the socialistic pattern of development and absolutely rejected market economics. As a result, votaries of socialism gained ideological control in the academia. The more their ideology proved wanting, the stronger became their resistance to change. Thus, confrontation to change has become a contagion in Indian universities. The situation is so bad that even such a prestigious institution as the Delhi School of Economics, in which Professor Amartya Sen, India’s only Nobel Prize winner in economics, and the current Prime Minister Dr.Manmohan Singh, used to teach, could not update its syllabus for 25 years. Such no-changers are still powerful; they will oppose the idea of a Research University as it will not accord with their ideology. Fifty years ago, the vice-chancellor of a famous Indian University declared “out of quantity will come quality”. To this day, Indians are obsessed with quantity. That is probably because they are so poor that, like Oliver Twist, they merely ask for more, not for something better motivated parents force children to study long hours not to make them great scholars but to prepare them for lucrative careers in business. State policy too gives higher priority to numbers and not to quality. Following table portrays the figures of the explosive growth in higher education does not tell the entire story. There is a trivial university in the Himalayas that awards 4-500 PhD’s every year. Even much celebrated Jawaharlal Nehru University is known to have watered down quality to increase the number of doctoral degrees awarded.
TABLE 1
TRENDS IN HIGHER EDUCATION IN INDIA
1981-1982 1991-1992 2001-2002
Total enrolment 3,000,000 5,270,000 8,821,000
Intake in Engineering 28,500 66,600 3,59,723
No of Engineering Colleges 158 337 1208
All Colleges 4886 7592 13,150
Faculty Strength 199,904 264,000 351,000
Ph.D’s Awarded 6080 8743 11,450
Ph.D’s in Engineering 139 299 739
Higher Education Expenditure:
% GNP 1.0 0.46 0.40

2007-08
FUNDED BY UGC—16000colleges
NAAC ACCREDITEDINSTITUTIONS—3492
A GRADE-9%
B GRADE-68%
C GRADE-23%
CENTRAL UNIVERSITY-25
STATE UNIVERSITY-231
PVT UNIVERSITIES-21
DEEMED UNIVERSITIES-100
NATIONALOPEN UNIVERSITY-33
BEST UNIVERSITIES IN INDIA-9(UGC CERTIFIED BASED ON NAAC REVIEW)
BEST COLLEGES IN INDIA-100
BEST SELF FINANCING COLLEGE-250
BEST DEPTS—512

(Source: University Grants Commission Annual Reports; Report of the Review Committee of the All India Council of Technical Education)

It is abundantly clear from the views of the Planning Commission that, “The main objective in the Tenth Plan is to raise the enrolment in higher education of the 18-23 year age group from the present 6 per cent to 10 per cent”. That is the objective in spite of the fact unemployment among graduates is estimated to be over 20 per cent, and under-employment is probably over 50 per cent. In fact, one of the chosen institutions was considered by the University Grants Commission of not worthy of a paltry seven million dollar grant to be given to “Universities of Excellence”. Numbers count; quality does not. But, the need of the hour is to produce quality students. This is a big challenge and all attention and focus need to be given to attain the objective. I must confess that, I am not professionally competent to pronounce on issues involved in building world class institutions in India, but I would like to highlight some of the commonly perceived issues pertaining to higher educational institutions in India.
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ESTABLISHING WORLD CLASS EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION IN INDIA — PROBLEMS & PERSPECTIVES:

To set up world-class higher educational institutions in India is not a simple economic problem, not even a question of educational policy but to make over the basic culture of the nation. For that reason, a detailed study is required to test the following hypothesis:
• Reservation for backward castes, judicial interventions in the management of colleges, opposition to elite institutions by civic groups, restrictive regulations, officious interference, will all increase. They will combine to prevent the materialization of merit-based world-class research universities.
• Indian industry will continue to depend on imported technology and will not finance research universities.
• The government will assist, or accord recognition to, only those private institutions that accept government control and surrender both administrative and academic autonomy. Hence, private institutions too will be handicapped in becoming world-class universities.
• Professional education will be organised as a for-profit business and aim at making money and not towards pursuit of knowledge.
• Admissions will be based on nationwide entrance examinations common for all institutions, from the most to the least scholarly. Coaching institutions will proliferate.
• Those who learn by rote will gain admission, not those who study in depth. Talented but poor children will not get the skills needed to write entrance examinations.
• Elementary education will continue to be neglected. In higher education, the emphasis will be on numbers and not on quality.
• Only those private institutions that accept no grants from the government, and further, award no degrees, will have the academic and administrative freedom to organise world-class higher education and research.

India can hope to have Research institutions, only when these entire hypotheses turn negative. Further more, I wish to mention some of the problems that the institutions of higher learning have been facing:

I. PROBLEMS:
i. ACADEMIC QUALITY:
No educational institution can survive unless it can attract competent young teachers into its fold. All professional colleges face serious problems. in this regard; they cannot compete with the outside market in terms of financial package. But I think that we can still manage to attract young talent, if we recognize and reward merit. In other words, we should develop a system of accelerated promotions for those who cultivate the qualities of excellence such as innovative teaching and research publications. It is for this reason that American Universities by and large score over other Universities. . The problem is compounded by the regulations concerning sanctioning of posts. A deserving person may not get promotion, because there is no sanctioned post. An autonomous institution should be in a position to handle these kinds of problems.

Teachers in professional colleges are in a position to take up consultancies and projects and thereby to enhance their income. We must give confidence on these activities subject to well-defined rules and regulations. Obviously these consultancies cannot be at the expense of what a person is expected to do in the institution. Hence there should be limit as to how much work a person take up from outside.

ii. FINANCING HIGHER EDUCATION
The present philosophy is that all educational institutions must be as far as possible self-financing. It means that every student must substantially bear the cost of education. If the proposition is pushed to the logical extreme, it may spell disaster in a country like India. This is a serious problem in the context of privatization of education: how to ensure equity in relation to weaker sections and transparency in financial dealings. All of us agree that education shall not be treated as a business to generate profit; but at the same time an educational institution should be self- sustaining as far as possible. In relation to public institutions, there should be substantial governmental assistance for infrastructural development; and the current expenditure should be met by the tuitions fees. In order to ensure that no meritorious student shall be denied of educational opportunities on account of financial constraints, there should be sufficient means cum merits scholarship.

How to generalize these propositions is the most terrifying challenge which Indian Higher Educational System is facing at present. The issue which ought to have been handled by the Executive and Legislative branches finally landed itself in the courts of law. Unlike the other branches of the Government, courts cannot pass the buck and they have handled it as best as they can. This is not the forum to get into this rigmarole except to say that confusion has become worse compounded with every judgement; and as a result, it has virtually become impossible to find a golden thread out of this labyrinth. This is bound to happen if the law lords asked to handle the policy issues falling in the legislature’s domain; for the judiciary by the very nature of its function cannot have the comprehensive view of the problem and is not in a position to prescribe comprehensive solutions.

To achieve privatization without commercializing education, two effects are necessary:
a) Students must be admitted into educational institutions on the basis of some objective criteria; and this would include reservations for weaker sections as well;
b) Private institutions should be able to charge adequate fees in transparent way without indulging in profiteering.

To ensure objective criteria, students should be admitted on the basis of entrance tests. There could be one test for public institutions and another for private institutions which would be charging higher fees. Private institutions should be given freedom to charge reasonable fees. There should be a regulatory authority to ensure that fees charged are reasonable and transparency is ensured in admission and fee payments.

iii. PROTECTING WEAKER SECTIONS—BELOW POVERTY LINE (BPL)
Reservations based on the principle of compensatory bias are a distinctive involvement of our constitutional jurisprudence. Under Article 15 of the Constitution, the state can make special provisions for the advancement of educationally and socially backward classes, Scheduled Castes, and Scheduled Tribes. By and large, reservations in favour of Scheduled caste and Scheduled Tribes have been widely accepted. But even in relation to them, in order to ensure that the benefits would percolate down to really needy sections of population; it is necessary to exclude creamy layers from the scope of reservation. Our experience has shown that a small oligarchy among Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes would hardly benefit the community as a whole.

A few months ago, reservations in favour of backward classes are made compulsory through a constitutional amendment. The result would be that nearly 50% of seats in all India. Reputed Management and Scientific research Institutions in India such as IITs, IIMs and others would be reserved and only 50% would be available for open competition. Obviously, this is not the way to go about building world class institutions. It is absolutely necessary to encourage all meritorious students to realize their full potential and the Government and society must come to the aid of those who cannot pursue their studies on account of financial hardship. This is imperative both from equity and efficiency points of view. All of us know that the concept of backward classes is mined in politics and it has spoiled state-level institutions.

iv. SCARCITY OF WORLD CLASS FACULTY:
How to catch the fancy of world-class faculty at Indian salaries is a basic issue. In a way, teachers in India are quite well paid. While professors in the US earn barely two-three times their per capita income. In India, professors are paid twenty times the country’s per capita income. In prestigious institutions, the faculty get, in addition, several perquisites including a quality of accommodation that even the very rich cannot hope to enjoy. However, the actual salary is limited to US $ 10-12,000 a year – not enough to command luxuries like unusual holidays, not even necessities like large enough homes to keep their book collections after retirement. Further, teachers in India do not command funds for travel and research equipment the way teachers in the West enjoy. Neither do they have the quality of administrative support that teachers in the West take for granted. On the contrary, administrative staff in India acts like the police, ever checking, obstructing and snooping on what teachers do.

Consider an Indian institution inviting a few Nobel Laureates to give short courses and guide research scholars – long distance – with the help of Research Assistants located in India and getting million dollar grants. In this age of Internet, that could be as good as having them next door. Suppose, in addition, the administration is supportive and not inquisitorial. Such an institution can become an exciting world class institution and for a relatively moderate financial outlay.

Here is a lesson that India can learn, should learn. “Catching those young and fostering them well” is a better than neglecting them when they are young and giving them the special relaxation of the rules of reservation when it is too late. If this idea is accepted, world class Universities will function best with multi-stage selection. The first selection occurs, unavoidably, by parental interest – how well they inculcate interest in studies when their children are young, and to which schools they send their children. From the UK experience, academic oriented children should be streamed at a reasonably young age, possibly at the end of the primary school stage. Just as American universities shortlist applicants from India on the basis of the reputation of the colleges they come from, the world class University too could give preference to students from reputed schools. That will make those schools an additional level of selection. The entrance examination may still continue but treated only as an extra short listing criterion (and as a window for students from lesser schools), and not as the final decider it is today. Out of these multiple selections, the world class institution may interview two to three candidates for each vacancy and test their aptitude. In short, the world class institution may admit students the way institutions of higher learning in developed countries perform.

PERSPECTIVES:
Assuming that India will have the will to establish a World class institution of higher learning, for this purpose, there are three potentials to be noted.
1. Upgrade select institution: Upgrading existing institution has the advantage of low cost, established physical and administrative infrastructure and availability of experienced core faculty. The disadvantages are overloaded infrastructure; rigidified administration that may or may not be suited to support competitive research, political control that may or may not support quality education. Established institutions will also have several faculties who are too conventional and not receptive to academic innovations. They may also feel threatened by the induction more competent youngsters from outside who may demand international salaries. Invariably, existing infrastructure is run down; existing faculty are sub-standard will resist induction of world-quality staff.

2. Create a new institution for higher learning: India has adopted this approach whenever it underway an experiment in starting new institutions. A new set up has the advantage that selected and well-pruned faculty can be inducted without humiliation and at international salaries. Novel academic and administrative processes may be introduced without having to face opposition form entrenched vested interests. It has the disadvantage that many reputed faculty may not agree to shift form their existing institutions. Infrastructure (both academic and social) will take quite some time to meet requirements. After all the effort and expense, the new institution may not be any better than the old.

3. Start a new non-degree awarding institution in the private sector: That is how the Indian Institute of Science started with a special embargo from Jamshedji Tata not to tie students to any examination system. In recent years, the Indian School of Business has come up in a similar manner in Hyderabad. It is entirely private funded; accepts no grants from the government nor awards any degrees. Thus, it has freed itself of all government controls. It can and does pay high enough salaries to attract apparent faculty from across the world. It has set new values in management education the same way Indian institute of science did for science education a hundred years back. However, only the very rich can have the funds for studying there. Can such institutions attract endowment and scholarships as well as US private universities carry out to make fees affordable by all able youth?

In the light of the above, All three choices will have their supporter and attacker. It will require deeper study to decide what option will suit India best.

THREATS OF FOREIGN UNIVERSITIES
The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) treats educational services as one of the services to be liberalized internally and externally. In Indian context, it would mean that foreign educational institutions should be in a position to open their branches in India. Indian policy in this regard is of two minds. One point of view is that they may be allowed to enter into the country subject to all the rules and regulations applicable to private educational institutions. Indian middle class seems to welcome foreign institutions with the hope that they would raise the standard of education in the country. There is no doubt that our educational institutions can benefit a lot by collaborating with good foreign institutions. But permitting foreign institutions to run the establishments on their own is a different ball game altogether. Prima facie, there is nothing wrong in allowing them into the country provided they comply with all the relevant local laws applicable to private institutions. Hopefully, resultant outflow of foreign exchange will not be much of a concern in view of our comfortable balance of payments position. We do not have ample experience of globalization of services. But if we can extrapolate on the basis of our experience in the context of movement of goods and capital, we may derive a couple of lessons. We can never take it for granted that globalization will always be a positive sum game beneficial to foreigners and host country. It can benefit the host country, provided the host country is competent to handle the situation properly. In brief, as applied to educational scenario, our priority should be to put our house in order to begin with. Let us come to grips with the problem of establishing a proper framework for indigenous privatization of education. Only after internal consolidation, let us think of inviting foreign universities to set up their establishments here. Unless we develop internal strength, it will be unlikely that foreign institutions can be subjected to our regime.

The aforesaid perspective could help to build extremely strong and vibrant world class higher educational institutions meant for teaching and research in India which could ultimately create intellectuals.

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