The University Grants Commission (UGC) has received over 100 applications from various educational institutions across the country for the Ministry of Human Resource Development’s (MHRD) ambitious 20 world-class institutions project, the MHRD said in a statement on December 13, 2017.
“Overwhelming response to the idea of Institutions of Eminence, which will become World Class Universities, is a validation of the vision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi for improving the quality of Higher Education in India”, Union HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar said in the statement.
“All lovers of education will welcome this development. This is how World Class Universities were built in various countries. The same thing will happen in India”, Javadekar said, adding, “The selection of Institutions of Eminence will not only improve the quality of education, but also propel competition in the entire education sector”.
Under public sector, 10 Central Universities, 25 state universities, six deemed-to-be universities, 20 institutions of national importance and six stand-alone institutions have applied for the purpose. Under private sector, nine private universities and 16 deemed-to-be universities have applied in brown field category and eight institutions have applied in the green field category.
Those who applied from the public sector include seven Indian Institutes of Technology (Madras, Delhi, Bombay, Kharagpur, Kanpur, Guwahati, Roorkee), Delhi University and Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jadhavpur University, Goa University, Panjab University and Mangalore University.
Those who applied from the private sector include the O P Jindal Global University, Ashoka University, Manipal University and Amity University.
The 90-day deadline of receiving applications from all institutions had expired on December 13, 2017.
According to reports, the UGC had in September last invited applications from all institutions to enter the top 100 of global rankings with the government’s assistance.
The Centre likes to establish a total of 20 ‘Institutes of Eminence’ — a distinct category of deemed-to-be-universities, supporting them to become “World Class” institutions.
The selected institutions will have the freedom to choose their own path to become world-class institutions.
“The selection will be made through challenge method mode by the Empowered
Expert Committee,” the MHRD said, adding, “The selected 20 institutions will be named as ‘Institutions of Eminence’ which will have freedom to choose their own path to become. world class institutions.”
“The institutes will be provided with greater autonomy to admit up to 30 per cent foreign students, to recruit up to 25 per cent foreign faculty, to offer online courses up to 20 per cent of its programmes, to enter into academic collaboration with top 500 in the world ranking institutions without permission of the UGC,” the MHRD statement added.
As per the MHRD, these institutes will be free to fix and charge fees from foreign students without restriction. These institutes will have flexibility of course structure in terms of number of credit hours and years to take a degree, will also have complete flexibility in fixing of curriculum and syllabus.