Quality of Education in Universities
The Central Government and the University Grants Commission (UGC) are constantly endeavouring to improve quality of higher education in the country. The Central Government has launched several initiatives viz. National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF), Impacting Research, Innovation & Technology (IMPRINT), Uchchtar Avishkar Yojna (UAY), Global Initiative of Academic Networks (GIAN) in the field of education for the qualitative development of education in the country. Under the NIRF, Educational Institutions are ranked by an independent ranking Agency on the basis of objective criteria. Under the IMPRINT initiative, the Government has taken the initiative to address major engineering challenges through the collaborative efforts of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institute of Science (IISc). The objectives of UAY scheme are to promote innovation in IITs addressing issues of manufacturing industries; to spur innovative mindset; to co-ordinate action between academia & industry and to strengthen labs & research facilities. GIAN scheme is for facilitating partnership between Higher Educational Institutions of the country and other countries. The scheme is aimed at tapping international talent pool of scientists and entrepreneurs.
The UGC undertakes maintenance of standards in teaching and research and quality assurance in Universities, Deemed to be Universities and Colleges through the following mechanisms, namely: framing regulations and schemes and; disbursing grants to the eligible institutions. The UGC has notified several regulations with the objective of sustenance and improvement in the quality of higher education and for undertaking academic reforms. The regulations are available at http://www.ugc.ac.in/page/UGC-Regulations.aspx. In order to encourage research and development in the country, UGC has laid out schemes, awards, fellowships, chairs and programmes under which financial assistance is provided to institutions of higher education as well as faculty members working therein to undertake quality research covering areas of knowledge across disciplines including revival & promotion of indigenous languages. These schemes are at http://www.ugc.ac.in/page/XII-Plan-Guidelines.aspx .
Arising of vacancies and filling them is a continuous process. The Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and the UGC continuously monitors the filling up of vacancies in the institutions maintained by the UGC. The MHRD and UGC issues instructions from time to time to all Central Universities and Deemed Universities for filing up of vacancies. In the Central Universities Vice Chancellors’ Conference, held on 4th-5th February, 2015 and the Visitor’s Conference, held on 4th-6th November, 2015, the Vice Chancellors were exhorted to fill up the vacant position of teachers in a time bound manner. Further it was also discussed in a meeting with Vice Chancellors of Central Universities on 18th February, 2016.
The UGC has constituted a Pay Review Committee for pay revision of academic staff of Universities and Colleges. One of the Terms of Reference of the committee is to make recommendations on the ways and means for attracting and retaining talented persons in the teaching profession, as well as for furtherance of research in the University System and also for their career advancement in teaching and equivalent positions in order to improve the quality of higher education. The notification of the constitution of committee is as http://www.ugc.ac.in/pdfnews/UGC-notice-0002.pdf .
This information was given by the Union Human Resource Development Minister, Shri Prakash Javadekar today in a written reply to a Lok Sabha question.