Fifty Years of Higher Education in India: The Role of the University Grants Commission

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The University Grants Commission (UGC) was established by an Act of Parliament in 1956 though it actually started functioning under an executive order on 28 December 1953. Its charter was to regulate and control all tertiary level institutions in the country and to determine standards of higher and professional education. From the time the UGC was set up, there has been an exponential growth in the number of higher academic institutions which today employ more than 400,000 teachers with a student body in excess of 9 million. Recent years have also witnessed the mushrooming of private institutions which are largely beyond the remit of the UGC. The result is a chaotic situation where institutions are free to do what they want with little concern for students or for academic standards. This is the first book length study of the functioning of the UGC and, indirectly, of fifty years of higher education in India. Written by an eminent educationist, it critically examines the way in which the UGC has performed since its inception and determines the reasons for its failure. Dr. Amrik Singh maintains that the powers given to the UGC are severely limited and this, combined with poor internal management, has made it a largely ineffective body. The author offers a number of practical solutions which, if implemented, could go a long way towards ameliorating the problems facing the UGC today. These include: Amending the UGC Act to grant it more statutory powers. Adequate financial and administrative support from the Ministry of Human Resource Development. Expanding the UGC’s role of accreditation. Strengthening the educational structure at the state level. Designing and implementing new modes of testing in universities and colleges. Giving priority to postgraduate teaching and research. Encouraging teachers to take a greater leadership role. Developing mechanisms for student assessment of teachers. This book is neither a scholarly work nor a historical account of the UGC. Rather, it is a critical assessment of an institution whose role is central to the field of higher education in India. Timely and topical, it will be of immense interest to educationists and policy makers in the field of higher education, as also to the general reader.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Amrik Singh

After having taught for a quarter century, Prof. Amrik Singh went into administration. He remained secretary of the Association of Indian Universitities for a decade and a half and built up the organization. He also worked as Vice-Chancellor of Punjabi Univeristy. Patiala, but resigned before the expiry of his term. His experience in that capacity was analysed in one of his books Asking for Trouble: What it Means to be a Vice-Chancellor Today. It has been described as a â€˜minor classicâ€™. During this period, he founded and published two pioneering journals. â€˜The Journal of Univeristy Educationâ€™ (1962-67) and â€˜The Indian Book Chronicle: News and Reviewsâ€™ (1976-85). His study of the UGS (2004) is so far the only study of its kind and was awarded the Saraswati Award. He authored Examinations, Redeeming Higher Education and The Trap Called Teaching besides editing volumes on The Management of Examinations. Univeristy and College Finances and Higher Learning in India. His plays in Punjabi won several awards. Throughout, he held special interest in problems of human rights and minorities issues. He erved as one of the vice chairmen of the Peopleâ€™s Union for civil Liberties (PUCL). He headed the Minorities Council twice and continues to be its advisor. Prof. Singh is currently a member of the National Foundation for Communal Harmony and the National Integration Council.