The proposed standardisation of university syllabus will only drag down the quality of education to the lowest common denominator.

The Ministry of Human Resource Development announced a short while ago that it was introducing changes in the structure and functioning of central universities, numbering around 40. The suggested changes were made public in a proposed Universities Act. A large number of academics from various colleges and universities based in the National Capital Region examined the suggestions. They went through the proposed changes with a fine-tooth comb, since the proposed changes, if implemented, would affect the academic quality of tertiary education at the college and university level. After frequent meetings over six months, they have jointly produced a document titled ‘What is to be Done About Indian Universities? Reflections from Concerned Teachers’.

The document explains at length why they have found unacceptable, for academic reasons, much of what has been suggested. It is available on Facebook and has already brought in many worthwhile posts. It is an extremely important statement from a large body of teachers, containing their responses to the proposals, as had been requested. Hopefully, it will be discussed widely by the HRD Ministry, the University Grants Commission, and other organisations related to undergraduate and graduate teaching.

Education, unfortunately, has not been taken seriously enough by governments, either past or present. The abysmally low budget for education is now down to around a minuscule 3 per cent. Despite this, there is still a fond belief that development can be achieved. Development needs well-educated people or else it goes nowhere. Do politicians fear an educated citizenry?

Governments tend to start at the wrong end in their attempts to improve education, drawing plans to make dramatic changes at the highest levels, advocating more central universities, IITs, IIMs and the like. As is often said, the concern should be to improve the levels of existing institutions. Yet the nitty-gritty of education lies in the quality of schooling. Proposals made by United Progressive Alliance-II, for more universities, continue to be the project of the present government. But a serious revision of the educational system in India requires laying a good foundation for primary and secondary schooling by improving their quality in a systematic and rational manner. This applies as much to content as is does to facilities.

A higher budget would allow for a larger number of schools, and these are desperately needed. But numbers are not enough. The location of the school has to be such that it is not hijacked or marginalised by upper castes and the wealthy. The socially and economically underprivileged are then left without education. Schools also have to be adequately equipped, teachers properly trained, and the benefits of education made apparent. This needs as much careful attention as tertiary education. Without good quality schooling, the institutes of higher learning are handicapped. Students with substandard schooling are unable to cope with higher education, the heavy financing of which has little meaning.

Education has many functions. It provides information, as the Internet does, but the difference is that it is meant to provide reliable information, and teach students to think logically and analytically. If knowledge has to advance, existing knowledge should be questioned. Such critical enquiry is the crucial point of education in any field — whether the sciences, social sciences or the humanities. It is also incidentally the best job training a student can receive. Myth-spinning is important to a child’s imagination but should not be confused with learning and scholarship.

The linking of schooling to tertiary education also has to do with some reactions to the suggestions made in the proposed Universities Act. The proposed standardising and centralising of the syllabus has been suggested as a way to improve the quality of education. Also, the centralised recruitment of faculty and students, we are told, will allow them mobility. Can the complete syllabus for all subjects in 40 universities be centralised and standardised? It will be a mammoth, unnecessary exercise, predictably a disaster. The budget would have to be doubled to provide for adequate libraries and laboratories. Or will education be reduced to a set of statements to be memorised?

Better institutions will have to lower their standards to accommodate those that are inferior, in order to standardise the syllabus. The quality of education will have to be that of the Lowest Common Denominator. High standards demand diversity and a constant and reliable upgrading of knowledge, essential for nurturing intellectual curiosity. With standardisation and centralisation, universities will become teaching shops and coaching schools. A common entrance exam will mean a rush for the metropolitan universities, as these are better launching pads for decent jobs. How then will the system of quotas and reservations play out? Will the numbers have to be continually reconfigured?

The other major problem will be language. Today, regional languages are the effective medium in most universities, particularly at the undergraduate level. So, can teachers and students be moved from, say, Punjab to Kerala, with the demand that they have to use whatever language is current in the new place? Or will the transfer of teachers and students be also used as a punitive measure to silence opposition? Bilingualism — a regional language and a common language — may be one solution, provided a common language can be agreed upon.

This is just a sample of the kind of problems that will confront us if the proposed changes are introduced. It doesn’t take much foresight to predict the major casualties in our university system. Poor quality education and large numbers of young people who are unqualified for the jobs they seek doesn’t make for a healthy society. Neither the sciences nor the social sciences can be taught merely as identical information in 40 universities. Every discipline requires thinking, questioning and debating, as there is intellectual content in each subject, essential to its understanding. This debate cannot be dictated. A syllabus handed down ‘from above’ and not thought through by the faculty will be turned into merely memorising information.

If state universities provide poor quality education, then quality education will shift to private universities that do not have such restrictions. But private universities are usually unaffordable for most students. Public universities will become institutions for the poor, just as the government school system has.

A bigger problem will be the end of the autonomy of the university, as has been pointed out in the response by the Delhi academics. The viability of a university depends on its being an autonomous institution responsible for maintaining high standards and initiating innovation. The quality of the public university system and its continuance is crucial to any modern society. Private universities, however good they may be, cannot provide the required tertiary education for everyone. The proposed changes will therefore destroy the more significant aspects of the role and function of the university as an educational institution.

(Romila Thapar is Professor Emeritus in Ancient History, JNU.)