The Hindu Business Line : Creating the knowledge creators of tomorrow

The real challenge that India faces is creating a corps of talented and dedicated teachers if future generations are to be better educated and, more importantly, in the context of the move to raise student intake to meet the quota goals.

In one fell swoop, a few months ago, the Minister of Education articulated a policy that launched a national movement that can be best described as democracy by demonstration. Every budding professional in India — whether a doctor, a chartered accountant, an engineer, an agricultural specialist, a management graduate, a pharmacist, a scientist, a fashion designer, an artist or a veterinarian — was up in protest at the implicit and cynical devaluation of his\her professional future, as standards stood to be lowered because of the quota scheme to be implemented in some manner or the other.

The remedial measure suggesting that the total student intake be increased so that the absolute number of seats available to the non-reserved category remained the same was disingenuous, to say the least. Yet, all the debate and controversies have not raised on crucial question: Who is going to teach these extra candidates? How are the various institutes, that will suddenly have large enrolments, create faculties to maintain the teacher-student ratio? Where are the supply lines of human capital that will win the battles against ignorance? Quite simply, who is going to create the knowledge creators of tomorrow?

Faculty shortfall

The IITs, one is given to understand, face a collective faculty shortfall of 2,000. Since the older faculty members have started retiring in some numbers, teacher strength has begun to shrink. With the academic pay quite appalling, there may not be too many new faculty members on the horizon.

The plight of the IIMs, the NITs, major universities and other professional institutions is the same. The IIMs have a collective faculty shortfall running into the hundreds. A major institute in Delhi hashad to abandon its Masters degree programmes not because of lack of students, but because of a shortage of faculty members.

Taken together, for a variety of educational bodies all over India, tens of thousands of new faculty members are required. Where will they come from?

Incentives for Penury

Why would anyone want to join a university or an IIT, an IIM, an ISI, the IISc or the IGIDR as a junior faculty member on about, say, Rs 25,000 per month, after a doctorate, when an ordinary graduate gets precisely that or even a more at, say, a call centre? How would a director of an institute or a vice-chancellor of a university, after 30-plus years in the profession, feel happy to receive about Rs 40,000 per month when an average IIT graduate is hired abroad at salaries of $60,000 per year. A fundamental issue is being ignored. Those in charge of policy deliberations have to realise that that there is no motivation to join Indian academic institutions as faculty members. The days of self-abnegation are long gone. There is a demand for rewards right here and now for services rendered.

The real challenge

No wonder, the opportunities in banking or entrepreneurship appear more compelling. This is precisely what happened in the United States, and, wisely, academic salaries were increased, though not quite to private sector levels. The real challenges that face India are the enhancement of not just the quantity but, more critically, of the quality of higher education. That means, as a first step, paying better salaries to teachers, lecturers, professors, principals and directors.

Appropriate Amount

The next question, of course, is what is adequate? If one reviews the salary levels in India, ignoring overseas benchmarks, then an adequate salary is at least ten times the present levels. If the salary of an assistant professor at, say, the IISc or an IIT/IIM is Rs 25,000 per month, what would stop a fresh doctorate from joining a global investment bank at a salary of, perhaps, Rs 50,000 per month. Policy-makers must realise that pay for performance is an important accepted concept all over the world. China follows it, South Korea follows it, parts of Western Europe follow it and most of the US follows it as far as academic salaries are concerned.

Therefore, in any education sector debate on reforms, it is important to realise that if knowledge is to equal economic power, then there is a need to create the knowledge creators who will then influence tomorrow's student body. Given the current rates of pay in the Indian academia, that means enhancing salaries by a factor of at least ten.

Who will Pay?

Who will pay for these enhanced salaries? Why, the students, at least to some degree, of course. The current fee structure in India's educational establishments is extraordinarily low compared to those in other countries. Realigning and rebalancing academic fee structures, throughout India, so as to bring them in line with other similar economies will help generate substantial resources that will then provide institutions the ability to compensate the faculty commensurate with their skill, experience and expectations.

Second, a very large number of India's entrepreneurs have become fabulously wealthy in the last two decades. They can create endowments at universities and institutes to supplement faculty salaries. India's future economic progress, and productivity will be based on the ability to conduct high quality research, generating innovations. The US and South Korea did it. Now, China is following them. For India to contemplate such growth and progress, it needs a corps of faculty members and other professionals to be the knowledge creators of tomorrow. A pool of such talent just does not exist in India, while it does in the US, South Korea and China. Making academic salaries attractive will be the first step in India's long march to progress, and to do so it may be necessary to set up a commission on academic pay whose findings may then have the nature of an award that will be mandated for implementation in academic institutions across the nation.

(The author is Professor of Technology Strategy, University of Texas at Dallas. He can be reached at majumdar@utdallas.edu)