A helping hand for Indian universities (Philanthropy)

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A helping hand for Indian universities (Philanthropy)

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• Philanthropy needed: The future of higher education (both public and private) in India will depend on how much philanthropy (individual, institutional, corporate) we can attract.
• The Companies Act, 2013: The mandatory Corporate Social Responsibility clauses (CSR) were the first legal push to ensure “philanthropy”. It had the promise of changing the relation between business and society, though it hasn’t delivered so far.
• Little strategic thinking: Not only do records show small number of firms doing CSR, most were just contributing to the PM Relief Fund. That is unimaginative. CSR is not just charity, but beyond that.
• Social sector and Education sector: No doubt, social is important. But higher education needs a lot of support from the corporates. Every aspect of higher education needs funds. In fact, the Ministry of HRD must work closely with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, to smoothen the process.
• Narayana Murthy Committee (by Planning Commission): It had suggested that private sector must come in higher education in a big way. Recommendations – free land for 999 years, 300% deduction in taxable income, 10 year multiple entry visas for foreign scholars coming for research. A Rs.1000 crore scholarship fund to help needy students was also suggested. Nothing was implemented!
• Five major reforms now: These are in areas of regulation, accreditation, rankings, autonomy and internationalisation. But the most crucial resource is funding.
• Budgetary funding: This is inadequate, and simply being smarly re-engineered each year. It needs a total overhaul.
• Public and Private both suffering: While the private support to institutions (through philanthropy) is very limited, the public institutions do get funds from governments, but the processes are cumbersome. Private sector liberalisation (to build Universities) has led to mediocrity proliferating.
• IOE experience: Sadly, this too has not been enthusing. So now, time for big time philanthropy has arrived.
• Summary : The higher education sector in India is suffering from the most fundamental problem – lack of financing, and the way to solve it is to increase philanthropic participation.

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