|
Against commercial education: students protest in New Delhi earlier this year.
|
Key figures,
India
|
Total population (millions, 1999): 998
Adult literacy rate (1998): 55.7%
Gross enrolment ratio (1997):
- Primary education: 100%
- Secondary education: 49%
- Tertiary education: 7%
Students enrolled in private primary and secondary schools (1997): 26.1%
Sources: World Bank, UNDP, OECD. |
|
Samik Lahiri, general secretary of the Students’ Federation
of India (SFI), one of the world’s largest such organizations, raises the alarm over
advancing commercialization
When did the commercialization
of education became a concern for the SFI?
SFI has been strongly protesting moves to privatize education since the early
1990s when the process of economic liberalization started in India. Since then education
has come under severe threat due to the policies of successive governments bent upon
following the World Bank’s privatization agenda. While the share of higher education
in the government’s total education budget has gradually declined over the years,
private investors have gained more and more access to the market.
Despite rules to monitor private institutions, there is in reality no government
control over most of the private medical, engineering and other colleges mushrooming
all over the country. Most of them have no infrastructure, offer poor quality education
and charge very high fees that can’t be afforded by even the middle class, let alone
the poor.
What are the implications for students?
First, private investors are setting up large educational institutions where
entry is based more on the capacity to pay or donate large sums of money than on
merit. In recent years we have also seen the emergence of small time fly-by-night
operators. They claim to charge lower fees and set up illegal institutions that are
sometimes housed in one-room structures, like a dental college we came across near
Agra, in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. Many private institutions in states
like Bihar do not even have the minimum number of teaching faculty required by government
rules. Whenever there is an official inspection, they simply hire extra professors
who disappear afterwards.
In clear violation of a Supreme Court order passed in the mid-1990s, some private
institutions allocate places beyond stipulated limits to those who have money instead
of giving opportunities to meritorious students. There were reports that during the
most recent admissions to a private medical college in the southern Indian city of
Manipal, the highest bidder paid Rs 26 lakhs ($58,000) for a place.
Even in government institutions, fees are being hiked to such an extent that meritorious
students from poorer families are finding it harder to pursue their studies. Universities
are now expected to raise 25 percent of their recurring expenditure through fees
and other methods. We found that due to a cash-crunch, many government-run institutes
were unable to upgrade their laboratories and syllabi.
Has commercialization improved the quality of education?
No. The overall quality of private educational institutions is abysmal, though
there may be a few exceptions like the Pai group of educational centres operating
in southern India. Our own studies found that some promoters of private educational
institutes openly violate the laws of the land, primarily through the fact that they
run their institutions in the name of trusts, meaning without a profit motive. Despite
making huge profits through students fees, these private institutions submit records
showing that they are not making any and claim that they’re re-investing the money
to set up more institutions.
What kind of public response has there been?
People are upset, but they don’t have a forum to protest. Apart from the left,
even mainstream political parties are not bothered about this. A large section of
the media has failed to take up the issue and concerned students are not allowed
to raise their voice. In fact, the government did not give permission to the SFI
to hold a rally on the issue in New Delhi last September, but we organized demonstrations
in most state capitals. In November, we plan to mobilize 100,000 students in Delhi
to protest against the commercialization of education.
|
