Chennai: Educationists have flagged concerns about the lack of funding provision for state universities in the new Vikshit Bharat Shiksha Aadhishthan Bill, which was introduced in Parliament. It aims to establish a single overarching authority for higher education, replacing legacy regulators such as the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE).
State universities flourished due to this funding.
It may come to Union govt asking state govts to bear the expenditure for higher education,” said senior academician S P Thyagarajan. “The existing bill will lead to patchy implementation of the National Education Policy 2020,” he said. University of Madras former vice-chancellor P Duraisamy said, “UGC funded state universities to appoint new faculty members, and with travel grants and new projects. G Visvanathan, former vice-chancellor of Tamil Nadu Teacher Education University, said a single body regulating teacher education, engineering education, and higher education is not feasible. “Asking universities to generate their own funds will make education unaffordable,” he said.
accreditation, academic standard setting, and funding, educationists say the funding model for state universities is not provided in the new bill Although the bill seeks to set up different verticals for regulation. “This is going to be discouraging for state govts and Union territories. The new bill, however, has no mention of funding state universities. State govts do not have enough resources to fund research in higher educational institutions. He urged Union govt to continue the existing funding system by UGC through an alternative arrangement.