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INDIA: Severe academic shortage hits elite institutes
Alya Mishra
02 May 2010Issue: 122
India's lite institutes of technology, or IITs, and institutes
of management, IIMs, whichtrain some of the country's top engineers
and managers are battling a severe shortage of
academics that threatens the quality of education at the
sought-after institutions.
The number of academic vacancies in the seven old IITs has
increased from 877 in 2008-
09 to 1,065 in 2009-10, Junior Education Minister Daggubati
Purandeswari said in a
Parliamentary answer last week. The vacancies in the seven
institutions in 2007-08 stood
at 971.
Many top staff are lured away by better salaries in industry
which can amount to three
times an academic's salary. Despite the prestige of these
institutions within India, they
have been unable to attract faculty from abroad because of
limited finances.
"Recruitment of faculty is a continuous process and all-out
efforts are made by theinstitutes to fill up vacant posts,"
Purandeswari said. "Institutions have been employing
suitable strategies to attract and retain quality faculty which
include attractive pay
structure, provisions of good residential accommodation, medical
facilities, initial
research grants and so on."
The technology institute at Kharagpur has 299 academic
vacancies, followed by 222 at
IIT Bombay, 194 at IIT Roorkee, 138 at IIT Madras, 78 at IIT
Delhi, 69 at IIT Kanpurand 65 at IIT Guwahati, Purandeswari
said.
The problem has been compounded with the opening of eight new
IITs during 2009 and2010 to cope with a burgeoning demand for
engineers. The new institutions are
struggling to fill 280 faculty positions.
Meanwhile, some 95 vacant posts exist at the country's seven
institutes of management.
Seven new IIMs planned by the Education Ministry will need 392
more academics over
the next three years.
According to the IITs, the 15 institutes will need 12,000
academics over the next 10 to 12
years to maintain the current student teacher ratio of 10:1.
In 2010, 450,000 students applied for the 7,000 places at 15
IITs.
The teacher shortage is threatening the quality of the coveted
government institutions.But the situation echoes shortages
elsewhere in the university system. A sample survey of
47 universities by a government pay review committee in December
2008 showed that
48.6% of teaching posts were vacant. Out of the 16,579 posts,
only 8,064 were filled.
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The 12 new central universities that became functional this year
are also struggling to fill
vacancies. The Central University of Orissa, located in Koraput
- a tribal-dominated
district with minimal facilities - is finding it extremely
difficult to attract faculty. Theuniversity has four academics for
150 postgraduate students and needs to recruit a further
11.
The National Knowledge Commission, a think-tank on education,
said in 2006 that India
would need 1,500 additional universities to cater to the
aspirations of young Indians.
There are 504 universities and higher education institutions at
present.
But focusing on expansion without planning for academics or
infrastructure has left the
newly established higher educational institutions in a
lurch.
Education Minister Kapil Sibal plans to raise the gross
enrolment ratio in higher
education of 18-30 year olds from the existing 12% to an
ambitious 30%. To achieve that
he has to find the teachers for the university classrooms.
Comment
The shortage of faculty in universities is nothing new. This has
existed since the 1990s.There is no coherent policy in this matter
with central and state governments. It is better
to re-employ highly qualified retired faculty in government
universities. Raising the
retirement age to 65 and for re-employment to 70 has not helped
much in the centrally-
funded institutions.Thousands of these people are already
employed in private deemeduniversities for very high salaries which
they have not seen in their active service with
government universities before. Therefore re-employment of
retired faculties on liberal
service terms based on the individual's merit is the only way to
solve this problem.
Professor T.K.Raja,
Department of Biotechnology,PSG College of Technology,
Coimbatore 641004,
INDIA
Comment:
It is true that there is acute shortage of qualified faculty in
institutions of higher learning.
The shortage of faculty in state and central universities has
greatly affected the quality ofteaching and research activities. In
spite of the revised pay scales, it may become difficult
to find qualified people,since the output from the institutions
may barely meet the
demand.
Professor K.K.Achary,
Mangalore University,Konaje, Karnataka, India
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