EDUCATION TODAY - Depending On The Fine Print

By M H Ahssan

UGC raises a flag against bad apples in the education sector, but is it enough?

Last week, the University Grants Commission (UGC) put up a notice on its website warning private universities against running “off-campus centres beyond the territorial jurisdiction of their states in violation of the UGC regulations”. The notice carried a list of 40 bona fide private universities across India. “We were getting many queries from students, so we thought it would be better to put the list on the website. It (private universities) is a new system after all… came into being only five years back,” says UGC Secretary R.K. Chauhan.

Juxtapose this with the fact that in the January-March 2009 period, education was the biggest sector in print advertising. Even when advertising volume declined 3 per cent compared to the same period last year, there was a 13 per cent increase in volumes from the education sector. According to TAM Media Research, 71 per cent of the advertisers in education category were institutions, while 15 per cent were coaching centres. Typically, January-May is the time when advertising hots up in the education sector because it is when academic sessions end and the search for new avenues, colleges, career options and coaching institutes begins.

TAM Media Research data shows that Planman Consultant India was the biggest advertiser during the first quarter of 2009. Planman is the brainchild of Arindam Choudhary, founder of the Indian Institute of Planning and Management (IIPM). In June last year, IIPM won a case it had filed against the UGC in the Delhi High Court to get its name removed from the UGC website, which listed IIPM as a “fake university”. But IIPM had to concede in the court that it does not award any degrees, only ‘prepares’ students for a degree from International Management Institute, Belgium.

Interestingly, coaching institutes, which run without any regulation, also advertise heavily. According to TAM Media Research data, Chate Coaching Classes was the third-largest and Forum for IIT JEE was the sixth-largest advertiser in print during January-March 2009.

The reasons behind the belated action by UGC are not far to seek. Human resource development Minister Kapil Sibal’s recent crackdown on deemed universities, 127 so far, especially those that got clearances in the past five years and his intent to follow the recommendations of the Yash Pal Committee report, which had come down heavily on the malpractices being followed in the system, seem to have jolted the UGC out of its stupor. “UGC is perhaps faced with an existential problem, and in order to hide its shortfalls, in order to escape the wrath of the new minister who is clearly not as complacent as his predecessor, it is trying to show that it is working,” says Mukesh Chaturvedi, senior professor at the Birla Institute of Management Technology (Bimstec) at Greater Noida. Bimstec has applied for a deemed university status.

Clearly, when private educational institutions do everything to influence public choice with their advertising firepower, UGC must do more than put up a notice on its website if it wants to safeguard the interests of students.

Even the Supreme Court had recently described private colleges as “masked phantoms” and flayed the regulator for its lax attitude in granting approvals. “With this notice, UGC is only trying to put up a positive face because it is scared of its own existence,” says Chaturvedi.

Others agree. “The attitude of UGC is scary,” says Sushma Berlia, president of Apeejay Stya Group, one of the applicants awaiting approval for a private university status from Uttar Pradesh and Haryana. “To expect ordinary people to be not just aware of the existence of a body such as UGC, but also check out their website regularly for fine details about the status of institutes is not correct.”

Instead, what is required is mass awareness campaigns through the vernacular media, print and television, over what to look out for while taking admission in any institute.