Kapil Sibal - You are right. Yes, the curricula of IITs and IIMs need to be restructured. They seem to have lost their competitive edge. No doubt they are the best that we have - but not the best when compared with what is being offered in some of the best universities. Particularly the post graduate program has never attracted the best of talents. Otherwise, how can one explain the massive exodus of its gradudates to MITs, CMM, Stanford, Berkley etc for their second degree. Seldom a graduate of IIT does his PG in India - that is their confidence level in our system and that is the brand equity of of our PG program. Prestigious Universities across the world have acquired their prestige because of their research out put. IITs have acquired their prestige because of their UG program - which is their flagship.
Prestigious Universities across the world have become research hub of leading industrial houses. A lot of research is done in IITs - but a lion's share is from the government coffer. Prestigious Universities across the world attrract talents across the world without reservations. IITs nowadyas has become a citedal of our own reservations based on caste, community and creed in the same of social justice, giving a total holiday to efficiency. The knowledge pool available in the IIT system is, therefore, of questionable quality. Establishment of eight more IITs in different states, making the total to fifteen is right in terms of concept. But the question is, has enough home work been done to ensure the quality expected of an IIT. Admittedly the Undergraduate program is the true essence of IITs' success story - what type of JEE that we have which can be cracked at will by teaching shops in Andhra Pradesh and Kota. The admission procedures, despite various experiments done to break the monotony, still remain monotonous bereft of imagination.
In synposis, IITs still remain the best, becasue there is nothing better available. If Kapil Sibal opens out education to foreign investors and if that open door policy paves the way for world renowned institutions makes a beeline to India, and if what they offer is affordable, the challenges that IIT system will face will be stupendous and may be insurmountable. That can happen - and how IITs are going to face the challenge will be indeed interesting. It will not suffice if the curricula are restructured - we need to streamline the admission procedure so that best of the brains get into the system, merit being the sole criterion. We need to take a large number of students from abroad. This will create an academic ecosystem and facilitate peer learning process - which is perhaps effective way of learning. This is critical in the current context when quality of students is being sacrificed on the altar of caste based reservation introduced recently. No innovation seems to have been made in the IITs in the teaching - learning process.
If students are doing well it is essentially because they up till now represent the very best in the society. When the system faces the challenges of dilution, how the leadership in the System is going to sustain the same level of excellence appears anybody's guess.What is the percentage of students taking up international internship? Is is not true that if someone does international internship, it is because of individual efforts? How is it no serious effort is made to send out vast majority of students to do internship with corporate of international renown in an organized manner. This will give the students tremendous exposure, give them enormous confidence and endow them with remarkable maturity required to be a world class work force. The purpose of IITs is to enhance the competency of our youngsters in science and technology. Unfortunately the reward in research is slow to come, and when it comes, it is measly. This gravitates IITians towards businesses and managerial functions. This is called internal brain drain - which needs to be arrested. True R and D, done extensively and intensively, will gravitate international corporates to set up their R & D network here in India. This will kick start demand for serious researchers, which will kick start their price for excellence, which again will motivate many a students to take up R and D as their preferred career. “High level research in frontier areas, especially when they are in the niche area relevant for the growth of the country will give us leadership position in the comity of the world”.
We need to realize that it is the leadership position in R & D that gave the preeminent position to the US. Their open door policy to talented people across the globe enabled them to creat a formidable reservoir of knowdege force. Can't we take a leaf from them? Countries like the US have not only created knowldege - but created wealth out of the knowldege so created.
Addressing an International seminar in one of the IITs, a former Dy Director General of UNESCO made an intersting remarks: " Knowledge comes from the North to South whereas the Wisdoms comes from the South to North". What he had meant was that developed countries gave science and technology to devloping countries, the priceless wisdom always germinated in the developing countries for the developed countries to adopt. One of the acerbic and interpid professors interject to say: "Sir you are partly right, and you are partly wrong". An astonished UN official who genuinely thought that he was praising the host country asked him pointedly:'where did I go wrong and where was I right". The Indian Professor said: "Sir you were right when you said that wisdom flowed from the South to North; and, you were wrong when you said the knowledge flowed from North to South". He proceeded to say: " you never part with your knowledge free of cost, where as our wisdom is open and openly available. Every knowledge, you create, you patent. Whenever you give it to us, that comes with a heavy price tag - either an economic price or a political price or both" The Indian academic went further to say: "Sir, when we did the Pokhran II, you imposed sanctions, denied certain critical technology though they were needed for innocuous research in institutions like IITs. Does it not speak for itself"
The above underscores a cardinal truth in the modern society. Knowledge is not merely power, it is wealth. It needs to be promoted and protected. If 1.1 billion people can collectively work, become people with enormous skill sets, knowledge and erudition, we can make this country truly create. We can support the entire world with out superior capabilities and make the international community to look towards for guidance - in all spheres. That will be the real hallmark of greatness. Kapil Sibal appears to having the right hang - Will our politics allow him to do what he considers right is truly a billion dollar question.
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