No consensus on autonomy proposals in IIT Council meeting

Undergraduate students of the Indian Institutes of Technology who find a B.Tech programme too difficult after one year may soon be allowed to exit into a less stressful three-year degree programme instead. Offering an exit option instead of expulsion for academically weak students was one of the major decisions taken by the IIT Council at its meeting on Friday.

However, the Council, chaired by Human Resource Development Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, failed to reach any consensus on a proposal to offer greater financial and administrative autonomy to the country’s premier technical education institutions.

Financial autonomy

Unlike the Indian Institutes of Management, which raise much of their own resources and have greater financial autonomy, the IITs are dependent on government funding. Financial autonomy could allow the IITs to increase their fee structure. With regard to administrative autonomy, the Council was set to consider a proposal to allow the Board of Governors of IITs to appoint their own chairpersons and directors, rather than having such decisions made by the HRD Ministry.

“There was no consensus on these issues,” said one attendee of the meeting. Another attendee added that further consultations would be held with Niti Aayog and other stakeholders before proposals for autonomy were formally considered.

The decision to offer an exit option to struggling students comes in the wake of high attrition rates in recent years. Over the last two years, more than 2,400 students have dropped out from the IITs, although a large number dropped out of M.Tech and Ph.D programmes. Almost half of the drop-outs were from reserved categories, that is, students from Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe and OBCs, according to government data.

Basic degree

“Academically weak students, who are not able to secure the required credits for promotion to the next semester may be allowed an exit option with a degree programme after second semester,rather than being forced out of the programme. Individual IITswill decide modalities for this,” said an official statement issued after the IIT Council meeting.

“Right now, the only option is to expel a student who cannot cope up. This decision provides a way to allow them an IIT degree without getting into a stressful situation. Instead of exdpelling them, they can be moved to a less stressful programme,” said a senior MHRD official, explaining that the IITs could choose to introduce a three-year B.Sc programme specially for those who leave the B’Tech programme after the first year. Currently, the IITs do not offer any B.Sc degree programme.

Scholarships extended

Another step aimed at helping struggling students is to allow students who need an extra year to complete their degrees to avail of existing scholarships. “Continuation of the weaker section scholarships for slow paced students for one additional year beyond the regular term of four years” was also approved by the Council.

The IITs have also been asked to come up with action plans to improve research excellence and their position in international rankings, as well as to identify the thrust areas in which they will each specialise. In a bid to increase foreign students, they will be offered scholarships and allowed direct entry to the advanced JEE examination. Reforms to the M. Tech programme, including a uniform fee structure, as well as plans to fun hostel renovation, have also been approved by the Council.