By Melarbor L Thabah
In India, since independence till now, universities Vis-à-visCentral Universities are allowed to frame their own syllabus for Bachelor’s, Master’s and Course Work PhD. The same pattern follows for technical education where the technical syllabus of one state varies from the technical syllabus of another state where new modern skills are being taught. This brings about a lack of uniformity amongst educational institutions since the syllabus of one varies from the syllabus of another bringing about unbalanced heterogeneous knowledge though they are specializing in the same subject which includes the general subjects also or in the case of technical education. Some people try to not make anything much or not even a fuss about the impact and significance of the syllabus and try at times to belittle the impact of the syllabus which can be attributed to their lack of in-depth understanding about its impact and ramifications. The national governing bodies must take the whole book and not a page to follow the CBSE and ISCE pattern which follow the same syllabus pan India wroughting about consistency, homogeneity, conformity and uniformity.
The syllabus to me is the most important aspect of any technical – non technical education which shapes and molds the knowledge of the students to equip the students for future battle of the minds be it research, training, teaching, entrance, profession and equitability. Syllabus ensures alignment pan India with learning outcomes, ensures academic, post academic and job success by establishing clarity, clear expectation, provides structure, organization, acts as a roadmap for learning guides, assessment,evaluation and most crucially ensuring standardization pan India. It is equally important for me to have a uniform syllabus for higher technical and non-technical education and post graduate diploma because of the following reasons:
Superiority: No university central, state, private, semi-private university, ITI and other technical institutes can claim that their syllabus both theory and practical is superior to the syllabus of another educational institution. The reason why I stressed on the “Syllabus Factor”is because the education being imparted from what was printed on the syllabus makes all the difference in determining the superiority of one educational institution from the other For instance, Jawaharlal Nehru University can claim that is syllabus is superior to Delhi University or to any other Central, State, Private and semi-Private / PPP university or IITs and IIMs to other technical and management institutes. By having a uniform syllabus mandatorily prescribed by the UGC or other national governing bodies evades this complication.
Entrance: It is hard to pass entrance exams of IITs, IISCs and universities of national eminence and repute when the syllabus is varied and of low quality.
Job Exams: The exams for which a person will work for his entire working life and determine his career for decades and sustain him till his death are harder to pass when the syllabus is not uniform, especially national job examinations.
Teaching: The teaching will be of low quality because the syllabus is varying and of inferior quality. Students who pass out from institutes going to teach in other reputed institutions of national eminence should they pass through some luck will have a hard time adjusting to the current syllabus or whenever the syllabus is changed every three years.
Research: Research is the most critical factor so when the practical is not uniform for that subject all over India and when the theory of that subject(s) is not uniformly prescribed by the national regulatory body akin to the NCERT especially for technical education, the research will be of low par quality with publication only in the lowly journals of developing nations and developing continents and not those prestigious western journals with high impact factor. Innovation will be stifled in science which will not help in breakthroughs for technological development in the science field sans innovation.
This is why it is extremely important to have a regulatory body like the NCERT or something of that ilk to frame the same syllabus pan India just as ICSE and CBSE students have the same syllabus pan India. The syllabus will be the same irrespective of Central/State/Private/Semi Private (PPP) universities or for Engineering institutes, IITs and IISCs whose syllabus and research will be guided by the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research to be renamed as and redirected in its operations as Indian Council of Science Education and Research. The same method should also be used to guide all Management institutes and IIMs by setting up of the Indian Council of Management and Research. By doing so, the question of superiority of one educational institute over the other does not arise since a national council dealing in education and research in technical – non-technical fields respectively pan India is established by Ordinance to frame the syllabus for education and research.
There are 23 Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) in India in 22 states with only Uttar Pradesh getting two IITs. A few important points to note are (a).the remaining 8 states must have their own IITs for Technological progress pan India and no state should be left out, (b).Second, there must fundamentally be a governing body to frame syllabus for the IITs in India henceforth for the reasons aforementioned, (c). Third, the one IISc only in India must be brought under the ambit of the same governing body for IITs which is IISER. This IISc located in Bangalore shares 98% similarity IIT and hence must be merged and renamed as IIT Bangalore thus making Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh (one in the North India and to balance with one in South India) as the only last two states that will ever be granted special preferential treatment meted out by granting two IITs in a state. No other favoured grant in future should be ever made because there are 8 states of India which do not have even one IIT. The same goes with the Indian Institute of Management (IIMs) institute for which there are 21 IIMs for 20 states with where special preferential treatment meted out to Maharashtra which has two IIMs in the same stand and Maharashtra should be the last and only state to be granted preferential treatment like this ever again because there are 10 states of India which do not have even one IIM.
The medieval retrogressive mind set of having only a few IIT and IIMs in certain preferred states to maintain their specialty status is ludacris and preposterous since China, a communist nation has made higher Technical and Non-Technical education accessible to all its provinces and the time has come for India to do the same. Exclusivity to certain preferred states is the enemy of development. The 8 States should not have to ask for IITsnor for the 10 states IIMs which lack either or both of these institutions should have to ask for these institutes. The Education Ministry and Union Cabinet is duty bound to equipall states with the necessary education for streamlined progress of the nation.
Universities and other educational institutions must henceforth by Ordinance must never be allowed to set up syllabus upon the whims and wishes of the academic council of that university or educational institution but will now be made by a national collegium of experts in various fields pan India especially North East in the form of a Council like the NCERT which will prescribe the syllabus for Bachelor’s, Master’s and PG Diploma whether Professional or Non-Professional, Technical and Non-Technical institutions or Institutes which deal in pure technical fields of study to follow a uniform syllabus going forward. A governing council for syllabus prescription for the IITs and IIMs respectively should be the modus operandi for all types of educational institutions mandated by Ordinance to be implemented mandatorily and fundamentally throughout India. This is my cogent recommendation in the interest of the public in India.
