 SOME OTHER ASPECTS OF HIGHER
 EDUCATION

We have pointed out that there has been a continuous increase in the number of students in our universities and higher institutions. What we should demand of our system, to use the language of the Robbins Committee on Higher Education* is that,

"It produces as much high excellence as possible. It must therefore be so devised that it safeguards standards. We began our discussion of principles, by emphasising the claims of numbers. It is only fitting, therefore, that we should close it by emphasising the claims of achievement and quality. The two ends are not incompatible. Equality of opportunity for all need not mean imposing limitations on some. To limit the progress of the best is inevitably to lower the standard of the average. A sound educational system should afford full scope for all types of talent at all levels. In the past our universities have tended to set the tone and the pace for other institutions and it is probable that in the future they will have a similar role to play. We are proud to think that they have proved themselves well capable of comparison over the years with those of other countries in fostering intellectual excellence. We hope that this reputation will be sustained and that, while they broaden the basis of education for first degrees, they will also achieve even higher standards in the education of those who show themselves capable of advancing beyond this stage."

2. We may say that this is the objective that we visualize for our institutions of higher learning. The claims of efficiency and expansion have to be reconciled. It is neither possible nor essential for raising the cultural level of the community or efficiency in higher education to insist upon, subject to certain minimum conditions being fulfilled, uniformity of standards in our higher educational institutions. Some are bound to excel others; that is inevitable. It is not in every discipline that a university can reach the highest standard. There will be variations in the standards reached by our universities and higher institutions in the variou's disciplines. Some will specialize in particular branches of knowledge or, even for that matter, in particular aspects of branches of knowledge than others. Some universities and higher institutions in our country reach much higher standard than others in the quality of their staff, libraries, laboratories and general equipment. This lack of uniformity of standards will, no doubt, grow less with time. In the United States, there are over 2,000 institutions of higher learning with varying degrees of efficiency. This lack of, what may be called for

*Chapter 11, para 40, page 1.

want of a better word, uniformity of standards has not prevented that country from providing equality of opportunity to its young people and building up enviable traditions of scholarship and research in some institutions which have come to acquire world-wide reputation as centres of learning. Highly efficient as the new civic universities in Britain are, few will be prepared to go as far as to claim for them that they are in every respect equal to Oxford, Cambridge or London or some of the older Scottish and Irish universities.

3. The conclusion that we have been forced to is that we need in our country various types of universities and colleges, viz., teaching, unitary and residential, federal and affiliating or even purely affiliating and examining with proper supervision and control over colleges affiliated to them. Clearly, our resources do not permit us to have universities and institutions which will specialize in all branches of knowledge in all our regional centres. Somehow, we have to bring knowledge to the door of the common man. "Poverty", as Prof. Galbraith emphasises in his Affluent Society, "is self- perpetuating" and we have to discover means which will enable the individual to rid himself of it and to make the best use of whatever talent he possesses. We do not deplore the multiplication of colleges and universities in this country. In 1947 when we started on our career as an independent country we had 607 colleges, universities, and other institutions of higher education. In 1961-62 we had reached the figure of 2,329 universities, colleges and other institutions of higher education. The student population in 1947 in all our universities was 2,28,881. In 1961-62 it was 11,77,245. Naturally, this expansion has created problems of which educationists have to take note. While holding the view that it would be wrong for a wel- fare State such as we profess to be to deny equality of opportunity to all those who are capable of benefiting by higher education, we think that it is essential, in their interest, that the minimum standards demanded from those who enter our universities and higher institutions should be reasonably high. Among the many products of our universities there are bound to be young men and women who, in intellectual equipment, will be able to maintain their own against those produced by the best universities and higher institutions in the world. What is essential, however, in our opinion, is that there should be a generous system of scholarships and sizarships which will enable our young men and women to secure the benefit of the education they are fitted for. Those who have aptitude and merit should be enabled to embark upon postgraduate studies in our universities and higher institutions. Poverty should not be a bar to the attainment of the highest knowledge possible. We may point out that in Britain, 80% of students in universities are scholarship or sizarship holders. In fact, nearly all political parties are agreed that the proportion of scholarship and sizarship holders should be even greater than it is at present. They would like it to be almost cent per cent. The ideal that we should aim at is that higher education should be as free as the air we breathe, the only limitation being the capacity of the candidate to benefit by it. In simple language, all those who are capable of giving a good account of themselves in

universities and higher institutions should be enabled to do so and the State must hold itself responsible for discharging this most important of all duties in a socialist society. The number of scholarships and sizarships holders in our institutions was 32,560 in 1949-50. In 1960-61, it stood at the figure of 1,72,325. While progress has been achieved in this direction, we cannot say that we are satisfied at the pace of advance in this direction. It may be mentioned here that the amount of scholarship per head is grossly inadequate. It should be such as to cover a scholar's total expenditure in the university.

4. It must not be inferred from what we have said that our opinion is that all students are fitted for higher education, whether in the literatures, philosophies or the sciences of the age. The point, however, is that they should not be made to suffer from any avoidable handicap. It follows from what we have said that the number and amount of scholarships and sizarships will have to be considerably increased in our higher institutions. This increase will be a continuous process with the expansion of higher and secondary education.

5. We have considered it necessary to draw pointed attention to this aspect of the question because it is our firm conviction that the Centre will not be able to discharge its responsibilities towards higher education unless in its planning, it continues to derive inspirations from the obligatory character of its duty to provide good material for the technological and scientific age upon which we have entered. Importance is being attached to higher education and research in all countries. Expression has been given by educationists and publicmen to the fact that our universities and institutions sometimes find themselves denuded of the best talent in the country. They find for example that the conditions offered in the United States of America are such as to attract the best scientists to that country. The problem has not yet arisen in any acute form in this country so far. But with the development of higher education, this country too cannot escape this tendency. Appeals to patriotism, no doubt, have a value in influencing the young but they cannot if they are not supplemented by facilities for the acquisition of the highest type of knowledge in the country plus an assured decent standard of living, help young men from choosing to leave their country for those where greater facilities for the type of work they are interested in exists. In planning for our higher education, this is an aspect which should be borne in mind.

6. Some of the eminent men whom we interviewed were of the opi- nion that our young men enter the universities and professional insti- tutions at a comparatively young age. This is a question which we were not able to examine at any length because it was not within the scope of our terms of reference. We deem it, however, necessary, to make a reference to it because some of us strongly feel that there should be all over the country a minimum age for entrance into the universities and professional institutions.

7. Bound up with the question of higher education is that of the medium of instruction. We are hesitant to go into it because we recognize that that is not within our scope of enquiry. But obvi- ously, interchange of teachers and students which is vital not only for purposes of national solidarity but also for exchange of knowledge and dissemination of the work achieved in various fields of literary or scientific activity in our higher institutions will present insuperable difficulties if there is no link language in our universities. Almost all the witnesses who appeared before us expressed their apprehension that in the absence of a recognized link language, literary and scientific activity or professional efficiency may suffer.

SOME OTHER ASPECTS OF HIGHER EDUCATION