Every government laments the absence of world-class universities, without realising that their interventions and the growing intrusion of political processes are an important underlying cause. The downward trajectory of universities in India is no surprise. Political interference by the central government or state governments, which encroaches on the autonomy of universities, inevitably accentuates problems in higher education.
Such political intrusion in universities is not new. Starting in the early 1970s, state governments began to interfere in universities. It was about dispensing patronage and exercising power in appointments of vice-chancellors, faculty and non-teaching staff.
It was not long before similar reasons began to influence the attitudes of central governments towards universities. The turning point might have been the Emergency (1975-1977). This phenomenon increased in its incidence and spread during the quarter-century of coalition governments from 1989 to 2014. The competitive politics unleashed by changes in governments soon spilt over into universities not only as spheres of influence but also as arenas for political contests. Both Congress and the BJP were part of this process. Yet coalition governments provided a few checks and balances.
Political intervention and encroachment by governments with an absolute majority gathered momentum after the general election in 2014. The period since then has witnessed a pronounced increase in intrusion and government intervention in universities, which has gathered further momentum since mid-2019.
The blame for the state of our universities cannot be laid at the door of politics and governments alone. Universities as communities, and as institutions, are just as much to blame. The quality of leadership at universities has declined rapidly, in part because of partisan appointments by governments of VCs who are simply not good enough as academics or administrators, and in part because most VCs simply do not have the courage and the integrity to stand up to governments, but have an eye on the next job they might get. The professoriate is mostly either complicit, as part of the political process in teachers’ unions, or silent, preferring to look the other way, engaged in their narrow academic pursuits. Those who stand up are too few. The students are either caught up in the same party-political unions or opt out to concentrate on their academic tasks.
For university communities, it is imperative to recognise that such compromises are self-destructive as acts of commission. So is opting out, as an act of omission. Indeed, if universities want autonomy, it will not be conferred on them by benevolent governments. They have to claim — indeed, consciously protect — their autonomy, simply because autonomy is as autonomy does.
At universities, the appointment of VCs is the essential first step, if not a necessary condition, for subsequent intervention. In central universities, it is the prerogative of the Visitor — the President of India — who is not bound by the advice of the Council of Ministers in this matter, to select the vice-chancellor from the panel submitted by the search committee, which includes two distinguished persons from outside, nominated by the executive council of the university. Alas, these checks and balances embedded in the statutes are now circumvented by design with purposive choices.
Once the VC is appointed, the appointments of deans of faculties and heads of departments are now an administrative decision, as the non-discretionary principle of appointment by seniority or rotation has been dispensed with. Deans and heads are no longer independent voices. Thus, the process of shortlisting candidates cannot be objective or fair. The checks and balances built into university statutes for appointments of faculty members are circumvented further through purposive manipulation in the choice of subject experts in selection committees, who are mostly not qualified for the role. And these subject experts often refuse to sign the minute unless the specified candidates are selected.
It would be no exaggeration to state that faculty appointments at universities, as well as constituent undergraduate colleges, are increasingly driven by RSS ideology and BJP preferences in politics, with a focus on loyalty rather than talent or merit.
The ideology of the BJP and the RSS, which shapes their social and political perspective, is now exercising a profound influence on higher education in India. There are two apparent manifestations of this unfolding reality. First, there is a visible emergence of institutionalised control mechanisms that decide what universities can or cannot do. Second, appointments at universities, which should be the domain of universities alone, are increasingly influenced, if not shaped, by the political motivation and the invisible hand of governments in office.
The primary instrument of control in the sphere of teaching, whether appointments or curricula, is the University Grants Commission (UGC). There are subsidiary instruments of control in the sphere of research, indirectly through institutions such as the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), Indian Council of Philosophical Research (ICPR), Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR), Department of Science & Technology (DST), etc. Even admissions processes have been centralised in the National Testing Agency — CUET, JEE, NEET — the competence and integrity of which has been repeatedly questioned as leaks and scandals have surfaced. The rationale for such a centralisation is questionable and flawed.
In principle, determining and maintaining standards of teaching, examinations and research at universities is among the primary functions of the UGC. How can it independently evaluate the quality of university appointments if it is such an integral, if not complicit, part of the process? The UGC is the problem — it cannot be a solution. It performs the functions of licensing, regulation and disbursement. These three functions are not performed by one institution anywhere in the world because this eliminates all checks and balances.
Such power enables the UGC to exercise enormous control over universities. Its interventions at political behest and its belief that one-size-must-fit-all drives its fetish for standardisation, whether curricula, appointments, promotions, salaries, evaluation, administration or institutional architecture. Such levelling crowds out or pre-empts excellence, because it stifles diversity, pluralism and differentiation in higher education, all of which are necessary to develop academic excellence.
It is clear that the process of appointments at universities, undergraduate colleges and other higher education institutions in India is now seriously flawed. It is no longer objective. Selections are shaped by political preferences and political networks. The quality of those appointed to leadership positions in higher education, even if for limited tenures, is critical, because they willingly cede the autonomy of their institutional space for their political commitment or simply their career paths.
The quality of those appointed to faculty positions is perhaps even more critical because it will shape the future of higher education. If persons who are not fit to teach are appointed, it is bound to hurt successive generations of students, as these are permanent positions until the age of retirement at 65 years. This can only mortgage the future of public universities or other higher education institutions in India, for there are long-term consequences of what appear to be short-term interventions at a point in time. Moreover, it is exceedingly difficult to reverse such processes, even if and when governments change, because the time lags in implementing correctives are long.
It takes decades to build universities or higher education institutions, months to destroy them, and at least a decade to rebuild them.
The writer is an economist and former vice-chancellor, University of Delhi
