It is a platitude to say that Indian Higher Education must combine excellence and access. But almost every policy instrument that we adopt inhibits both aspirations. This is one area where government is more like the man who was looking for his lost key under the lamppost, not because he had lost it there, but because there appeared to be light there.Take two issues that exercise us considerably: the potential exploitation of students by private institutions, and the need to create access for socially marginalised groups. One important ingredient of addressing both concerns is increasing the supply of quality institutions. Yet we inhibit their creation.What are the bottlenecks in creating supply? The first element is overregulation in the wrong places. In what country in the world does the creation of a university catering to undergraduates require fresh legislation each time? In what country in the world do regulatory bodies apply an one-size-fits approach to all institutions? Instead of holding institutions accountable through transparency and competition, we confuse accountability with control. Instead of empowering parents and students to take decisions, we give the state more power to extract rents. In sector after sector, whether it is nursing or aviation, regulatory bodies are choking off supply at its roots.The second bottleneck is finance. Public investment is crucial to Higher Education, but the central government's total outlay is close to 8000 crores only. But additional resources can be easily mobilised. Think of how much disinvestment in a few PSU's would yield, if this money was earmarked for Higher Education. In one stroke, we could reform the state and mobilise more resources.But we are more interested in statism than access. By some estimates Indians are now spending over two billion dollars on consuming foreign higher education. Why cannot our system mobilise these funds? Why cannot we become the education hub of the world? Or further still, why cannot fees be rationalised, or universities manage their assets better? The third element in enhancing supply of quality institutions is serious institutional reform of public institutions. How many of our three hundred odd public universities are serious institutions? The core problem is that decision-making is no longer in the hands of serious academics. The imperatives of politics have taken over at almost all levels of governance. How can you have a competitive university system where incentives for performance are so ill structured, where all systems of accountability have broken down, and where institutional architectures marginalise innovation and reform?Even flagship institutions like IIT's and IIM's have serious faculty shortage. But the government would rather regulate the private sector than put its own house in order. Or finally take the problem currently on the agenda: access. Are numerical quotas the only solution to the problem of access? What about other policy instruments? Investment in primary and secondary education? Support programs and scholarships? Of course, our institutions need to be socially inclusive, and it is a loss to the nation if we fritter away so much merit.But is opportunity created by providing the artificial crutch of numerical quotas, or by providing adequate resources to all? Some form of affirmative action will still be required for some groups but who should such action target? Are the historical and social claims of OBC's the same as those of SC's and ST's? Is there no space at all to experiment with other forms of affirmative action?For instance, there are some well designed deprivation indices that give precise weight to different kinds of deprivation. These indices are both better at targeting deserving beneficiaries and picking out qualified students. Why is it that in a country the size of India different institutions not be allowed to experiment with different forms of affirmative action? What is most disquieting about the current debate over reservations is that it so vividly exemplifies the failings of our education policy. There is no room for freedom of institutions. Without freedom there can be no genuine diversity, creativity and innovation, even in matters of social justice. In this debate there is a profound anti-intellectualism that has no room for nuance and fine distinctions: even ministers and journalists are routinely getting the meaning of the recently passed constitutional amendment wrong.In this debate there is such an overbearing recourse to statism, as if government diktat can produce quality institutions or social justice. But it reveals two reasons why our Higher Education is worse than it should be.First, this sector is subject to more homilies and piety than analytical clarity; it is made to bear the weight of all aspirations: politics, social justice, state ideology; all aspirations except pedagogical ones. Secondly, this is one sector where everyone distrusts everyone else: regulators distrust institutions, who in turn distrust administrators, who in turn distrust teachers, who in turn could not care less for students, who in turn are cheated by the system, to the point where society comes to distrust the sector as whole. No sector can excel if its foundations lie in distrust.The author is convenor of the National Knowledge Commission
