Quality in higher education has become the prime concern of countries the world over. Establishing National External Quality Assurance (NEQA) mechanisms to maintain and improve the standards of education is considered to be the best way of responding to the quality concern. This is a relatively new concept to be adopted, perhaps just a decade old, even in countries like UK, Canada and Australia. By establishing the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC), India joined the international trend in 1994. In India, promoting quality in education has been the focus of almost all the committees constituted at different stages of the development of our higher education system. Among the various national consultations, discussions, and recommendations that gave a direction and focus to our developmental strategies after independence, the National Policies and Education (NPE) and the constitutional amendment of 1976 have played a major role. It was the National Policy on Education (1986) that gave a concrete shape to the assessment council and as recommended by the Plan of Action (1986), NAAC was established as an autonomous body by the University Grants Commission in 1994, after eight years of national level consultations involving a large number of academia, educational administrators and policy makers. The response from the system to the National External Quality Assurance agencies has been mixed, the world over. In India, the response of the higher education system to NAAC varied from Apprehension to Appreciation. For the past seven years, NAAC has been striving hard to promote the concept of quality among the institutions of higher education. Working towards this objective, NAAC has assessed around 200 institutions of higher education so far, with an internationally accepted methodology of self-study and peer review. This book highlights the impact NAAC has made on the system of higher education and outlines the future perspectives of quality assessment.
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