Space scientist and former ISRO chairman K Kasturirangan will head a nine-member panel that has been tasked with revamping India’s education policy, the PTI has reported.

The Prakash Javadekar-led Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry has chosen experts and educationists from wide-ranging backgrounds to be part of the panel that is expected to work on a New Education Policy (NEP).

Besides Krishnaswamy Kasturirangan, the panel includes Fields Medal winner and internationally acclaimed mathematician Manjul Bhargava from Princeton University and Vasudha Kamat, former vice chancellor of Mumbai's SNDT University and former IAS officer K J Alphonse Kanamthanam. He had played a key role in helping Kerala's Kottayam and Ernakulam districts achieve 100 per cent literacy, sources said.

Ram Shanker Kureel, vice chancellor of the Baba Saheb Ambedkar University of Social Sciences, Mhow, Madhya Pradesh, who has wide experience in the field of agriculture sciences and management, has also been appointed.

Dr M K Shridhar, former member secretary of the Karnataka State Innovation Council, Dr T V Kattimani, an expert on language communication, Dr Mazhar Asif, professor of Persian at Guwahati University, and former director of education, Uttar Pradesh, Krishan Mohan Tripathi also bring a wealth of experience to the panel, the sources said.

The council will start work on this with immediate effect, highly placed sources in the ministry said. The council will take into account 30 months of extensive exercise during which the ministry received many suggestions from educationists, teachers, students and other stakeholders of the industry across the country. Consultations were held from the tehsil to the state level. Regional conferences, debates at the Rajya Sabha, T S R Subramaniam committee recommendations and about 26,000 views from the people on MyGov platform will all serve as inputs to bring about a change in the educational policy.

An official said the panel has been carefully put together keeping in mind their expertise in diverse areas of education. “Significantly, the panel also reflects the diversity of the country as the members belong to different sections as well as regions," he said.