The University Grants Commission (UGC) has issued guidelines on institutional development plan for Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in which private sector partnerships for raising funds, ranking system for faculty members and the creation of "emotional infrastructure" have also found a place. These guidelines aim "to help universities, colleges plan for academic, administrative, and financial ‘self-reliance'," UGC Chief, M Jagadesh Kumar said. As per the revised guidelines, it is now compulsory for HEIs to identify and prioritise the sources of funding for the development of financial infrastructure such as government grants, alumni donations, private sector partnerships, and fundraising campaigns. The HEIs will also have to to work on a sustainable revenue model. The revenues for these should be derived from tuition fee from the students, government grants and subsidies, overheads earned on the sponsored research and development projects from the government and private sector and endowments. “In a fully developed HEI, each of these sources must contribute about a similar percentage to the total revenue, depending on the size of the HEIs. Therefore, HEIs must also focus on expanding their undergraduate programmes as additional students mean more revenue,” the revised draft suggested. Additionally, the drafts also state that faculty ranking or assessment around research-based Academic Performance Indicators (API) scores and subsequent additional incentives should be carried out in order to motivate the faculty members. “For teachers, the guidelines state that through university policy, a ranking system based on research-based Academic Performance Indicators (API) scores and subsequent additional incentives can reduce faculty oversight at every stage. “Such a ranking will generate a winning spirit among faculty, and faculty members will constantly strive for excellence when their annual rankings are announced. Faculty oversight at every stage can be reduced in such scenarios,” the guidelines stated.
