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F O R L e a d e R s i n h i g h e R e d u c a t i O n

Michael RussellCabinet Minister for Education & Lifelong Learning, Scotland

A stymied Foreign Education Bill has not doused the attraction of India as an education Hub for Foreign Universities Pg 16

volUme 03 IssUe 02 50a 9.9 meDIa PUblIcatIon

FebrUarY 2012www.eDU-leaDers.com

FAcE-to-FAcEPratap Bhanu Mehta,

President Centre for Policy Research P36

AdministrAtion Preventing suicides on

campuses through counselling P32

lEgAcy Shail Mayaram on

Philosopher and Thinker Daya Krishna P64

1February 2012 EduTEch

FOREWORD

Dr Pramath Raj [email protected]

Partners in excellence

“The key to success seems to be to recognise what value a partner brings and giving the partner space to contribute in that area...trust is the basis of all good partnerships”

In 1997, I had the honour of being associated with a landmark partnership signed between Indian School of Business (ISB), still four years away from its ultimate launch in 2011, and the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

The ISB-Kellogg-Wharton MoU formed the basis of active mentorship by two of the world’s top B-schools to create what has today become a globally top-ranked institution in India. ISB has since gone on to add London Business School (LBS) and, more recently, MIT’s Sloane School of Management and Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy as partners.

These partnerships helped in three ways. First, they provided the expertise and experience that the ISB founders needed to create a high-quality institution. While the founders brought the passion, energy and the capital, the partners brought the academic DNA required to build an enduring institution of higher education. So Wharton and Kellogg faculty and administra-tors helped ISB design its programmes, curriculum, pedagogical methods, and its admis-sions, academic administration, placement, alumni relations and its fund-raising process-es. In fact, LBS seconded a team to set up ISB’s Executive Education programmes in what was like a ‘build-operate-transfer’ model. Second, the partnerships enabled ISB to source faculty from the partner institutions, albeit on a part-time basis. Moreover, the faculty helped manage the academic administration till permanent faculty, who they helped recruit, came on board. Finally, the partnerships added tremendous credibility to a new institution.

I have now had the privilege of being involved in several such partnerships and I have seen those that work and those that go nowhere. The key to success seems to be to recognise what value a partner brings and giving the partner space to contribute in that area. I guess that trust is the basis of all good partnerships. Unfortunately, the unhealthy trend in India seems to be that one of the partners often want everything done their way. Moreover, in higher education, a number of partnerships merely exist in name or to create the illusion of credibility. We hope exceptions and our cover story package will help you make better decisions.

2 EduTEch February 2012

Contentsfebruary 2012EDU

update 05 Appointed RefoRms06 omBUdsmAn GRAnted08 AGReement fUndinG

Viewpoint10 Rs GRewAlBolster Higher Education

12 dheeRAj sAnGhiHow to Select a Dean

technology42 BRidGinG GApsIT enablement can help good colleges bridge gaps to distance educationBy Shankar Venkatagiri

46 tech eventEDGE-EX: 2012 By Viplav Baxi 50 cAse stUdyGreen IT — A practical case of implementationBy RT Sakthidaran

administration32 coUnsellinGPreventing on-campus suicides By Mitia Nath & Manjiri Indurkar

face-to-face36 pRAtAp BhAnU mehtAThe Soul Scientist By Smita Polite

global perspectiVe Find out what’s currently happening in institutions around the world. The Chronicle of Higher Education shares its perspectives with EDU54 new yoRk ReAps Benefits ofits BAnkeR’s lARGess By Mathew Kalman

56 ode to mUnificence?: chinA colleGe BUilds stAtUes of donoRsBy Mary Hennock

60 2012: AsiA to poweR GRowth in ReseARch & developmentBy David Wheeler

42

“ Teaching has been the most fulfilling and valuable activity in my career”— Pratap Bhanu Mehta, President, Centre for Policy Research

36

63


timeout62 BooksChanakya’s Chant

63 Gizmos & GAdGets

legacy64 pRof dAyA kRishnADr Shail Mayaram

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F O R L E A D E R S I N H I G H E R E D U C A T I O N

Michael RussellCabinet Minister for Education & Lifelong Learning, Scotland

A stymied Foreign Education Bill has not doused the attraction of India as an Education Hub for Foreign Universities Pg 16

VOLUME 03 ISSUE 02 50A 9.9 MEDIA PUBLICATION

FEBRUARY 2012WWW.EDU-LEADERS.COM

FACE-TO-FACEPratap Bhanu Mehta,

President Centre for Policy Research P36

ADMINISTRATION Preventing suicides on

campuses through counselling P32

LEGACY Shail Mayaram on

Philosopher and Thinker Daya Krishna P64 CoVER ART: PeTeRSoN

coVer story

16 eastward bound A stymied Foreign education Bill has not doused the attraction of India as an education Hub for Foreign Universitiesby charu bahri & smita polite

18 to bill or not to bill, that’s not the Question

25 anju banerjee md edcil on collaboration models of the future

26 c raj Kumar Vc op Jindal global university makes a case for globalisation

28 michael russell cabinet minister scotland says that india is on their radar as an important destination

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from the world of higher education


05 appointed 05 RefoRms 06 ombudsman

06 gRanted 08 agReement 08 funding & moRe

held Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh inaugurated the 99th Annual Session of the Indian Science Congress at Bhubaneswar. Noted scientists and speakers across the country and 15 Nobel Laureates participated in the five-day event that took place at Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology (KIIT), Bhubaneswar. Also present were Governor of Orissa, MC Bhandare, Union Minister of Science and Technology, Vilasrao Deshmukh and Minister of State for Science and Technology, Ashwani Kumar.

The theme of the conference was ‘Science and Technology for Inclusive Innovation — Role of Women’. On the current state of science and technol-ogy in India, Dr Singh said, “Over the past few decades, India’s relative posi-tion in the world of science had been declining and we have been overtaken by countries like China. We need to do much to change the face of Indian science.” It was also announced that Dr Singh will be the General President of the 100th Indian Science Congress to be held in 2013.

100th Science Congress in 2013The 99th Science Congress held in Bhubaneswar focussed on the participation of women in the field of science and technology

Science: PM Dr Manmohan Singh addressing the inaugural function of the 99th Indian Science Congress. He will be President of its 100th edition

honorary d LiTT To ShEikh haSinaPrime Minister of Bangladesh

Sheikh Hasina was conferred an

honorary doctorate of Tripura

University by Vice President

Hamid Ansari. This is the sec-

ond time that an Indian univer-

sity has conferred an honorary D

Litt on Hasina. The 64-year-old

Bangladesh leader was conferred the

honour by Visva-Bharati University in West

Bengal on January 28, 1999. Vice Chancellor

of Tripura University, Arunoday Saha, said

that this was for the first time that the Univer-

sity has conferred an honorary D Litt on any

person after it was set up in 1987.

Sri ShakThi india LEadErShip SummiT 2012 Sri Shakthi Institute of Engineering and Tech-

nology, established by Thiru S Sengoda

Gounder Educational Trust, Coimbatore is

holding its annual leadership advancement

programme, on March 3, 2012, at the Hotel Le

Meridien in Coimbatore , with the theme of

‘Fearless Leadership’. This summit will provide

a platform for young engineering and busi-

ness graduates to interact with inspiring

visionary leaders from all over India. Last year

saw 19 speakers from diverse fields interact-

ing with 350 student delegates from across

the country. This year they aim to reach out to

more than 500 student delegates.

dEvELopmEnT cEnTrES To bE SET up aT iimSThe Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs)

plan to set up development centres to meet

rising expenses. The centres will work

towards building relations with philanthro-

pists, industrialists and alumni. This decision

was taken during a meeting of IIM heads. Ear-

lier, Hari S Bhartia Committee, in its report

had also suggested setting up development

centres to raise funds.

update


globalupdate

reformS Forty years of communism have left the educational systems of the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia

in jeopardy and far behind its Western neighbours. Now, education ministers of these countries, under the umbrella of the

Visegrad Group (V4), have come together to help the education sector with reforms. The influence of the Bologna Process, which

created a European Higher Education Area to facilitate international cooperation and academic exchange, has changed the way

the four countries view their educational systems. They have realised the importance of making their educational system inter-

nationally competitive. In November last year, the education ministers from the four countries had met to

discuss educational reforms. The group agreed to form a working

group comprising people from ministries and academics.

This exercise is aimed at strengthening public confi-

dence in higher education and build trust in universi-

ties and their results. The EU’s Europe 2020 plan

envisages increasing the number of youths who

complete some type of post-secondary educa-

tion by 40 per cent in 2020.

V4 to Work on Higher Education Reforms

appointed Prof Soumitra Dutta, 48, an alumnus of IIT Delhi, is the latest in a string of Indian origin appointees at internationally renowned business and management schools. Dutta joins as the 11th dean of the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cor-nell University. The appointment will be effective from July 1, 2012. In 2010, the Harvard Business School and the Univer-sity of Chicago’s Booth School of Busi-ness had named Indian origin deans: Ni t i n No h r i a a n d P r o f Su n i l Kumar respectively.

Dutta succeeds Joseph Thomas, and is the first dean of Indian origin at the 66-year-old Johnson. Cornell President David J Skorton said, “Prof Dutta’s appointment is a natural fit with John-

Soumitra Dutta is New Dean of Cornell B-schoolFirst dean of Indian origin in its 66-year history

Increase in post-secondary graduates envisaged in EU’s Europe 2020 Plan40%

Visegrad Group formed on February 15, 1991 has completed 20 years1991

son’s increasingly global out-look. He has expertise in new and emerging media, has studied the conditions that promote innovation and has extensive experience on international stage.”

Dutta is Roland Berger chaired professor in busi-ness and technology at INSEAD and has been a vis-iting professor at the Haas School at UC-Berkeley, the Oxford Internet Institute at the Universi-ty of Oxford, and the Judge School at Uni-versity of Cambridge in England.

He is a member of the Davos Circle and has published 20 books. He is co-editor and author, respectively, of two influential

reports in technology and innovation, the Global Information Technology Report (co-published with the World Economic Forum) and the Global Innovation Index (to be co-published with World Intellec-tual Property Organisation).

honoured: Prof Dutta is an alumnus of IIT Delhi and has vast experience on international stage

update


ombudSman The Ministry of HRD with its latest executive order has man-dated that all central higher educational institutions like central universities, IITs, IIMs and NITs, among others, appoint an ombudsman to redress griev-ances of students by the start of the next academic session.

The order will be applicable to all tech-nical and management institutions recognised by regulators such as the UGC, the All-India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and the National Council for Teacher Education. It will also apply to deemed universities recog-nised by the Centre and the non-degree granting institutions approved by the academic regulators.

The move comes in the wake of persis-tent resistance that the ministry’s ambi-

Ombudsman for Student GrievancesTo cover all central and recognised varsities, deemed, and approved non-degree granting institutions

t i o u s Bi l l o n establishment of educational tribu-nals met within the Rajya Sabha, where the Bill r e m a i n s i n a limbo.

HRD Minister Kapil Sibal said, “We can’t keep waiting. We have to move.” The ombudsman would address issues related to denial of admission, non-observance of declared merit in admissions, non-observance of applicable regulations for reservation, withholding of documents and non-refund of fees in case of withdrawal of admission, discrimination and matters concerning students in pursuit of stud-ies in the institution.

In matters concerning weaker sections such as SCs, STs, OBCs or minorities, the ombudsman can co-opt a person of eminence of the area from a weaker sec-tion to assist him. The ombudsman will have to deliver his judgment in a month. Though his order would not be binding, “non-compliance can lead to withdrawal of recognition,” Sibal said.

The ombudsman will have to be a per-son with a judicial or legal background.

redressal will now be possible for aggrieved students with HRD Minister Kapil Sibal announcing the Ombudsman

granted BHU, Osmania, Guru Nanak Dev, Mysore, Rajast-

han & Karnatak universities make it to the list

The University Grant Commission (UGC) has declared

‘potential for excellence’ status for six universities. The list

included Banaras Hindu University (Varanasi), Osmania Univer-

sity (Hyderabad), Guru Nanak Dev University (Amritsar),

Mysore University (Mysore), Rajasthan University (Jaipur) and

Karnatak University (Dharwad).

The universities were selected from a list of 31 that had sub-

mitted their proposals. The UGC had invited proposals from

universities that meet the eligibility criteria of UPE Scheme

from across India. Of the 31 respondents, 10 universities were

shortlisted by the UGC-appointed Expert Evaluation Commit-

tee on the basis of

parameters framed by

it. The parameters

included: standard of

governance, teaching

and research, etc.

The University with

Potential for Excellence

(UPE) Scheme aims to

encourage universities

to pursue world-class

standards in their chosen domain(s) by providing additional

funds. Apart from universities, this scheme also identifies col-

leges which have attained high standards in teaching, research

and extension activities and hold promise of excellence. A col-

lege selected under the scheme is provided substantial funds to

improve and strengthen its infrastructure.

UGC Grants POE Status to Six Varsities

update

voices

update


“Our economy is changing, and education can’t stop at

high school because by the next decade, nearly two-

thirds of all jobs in the US will require some kind of post-secondary education” —Jay NixoN,Governor of the US State of Missouri

“The burden of superstition and obscurantism is not

good. If society has to progress, it has to overcome

the ill-effects of superstitions. Science has a major role to play” — N RaM, Editor-in-Chief, The Hindu

“Higher education has been critical to India’s emergence in the

global knowledge economy. Yet, it is believed that

a crisis is plaguing it. The NKC calls it a ‘quiet crisis’while the HRD Minister calls it ‘a sick child’”— PawaN aGaRwal,adviser (Education), Planning Commission

agreement Department of Science & Technology and the National Centre of Scientific Research (CNRS) of France have signed an agreement to set up a vir-tual institute for applied mathematics in IT hub Bangalore for research related work.

Under this agreement, six institutes from India, led by the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, will par-ticipate in the project. Besides IISc, Chennai Mathematical Institute (CMI) and the Institute of Mathematical Sci-ences, Chennai and a cou-ple of IITs will also be involved in the initiative. The University of Toulouse will lead the institutes from France.

CNRS’s Director Gener-al, Joel Bertrand said, “We have decided to set up a virtual institute on mathe-matics in Bangalore. Along

funding The Planning Commission has roped in NR Narayana Murthy Committee to develop a framework for engagement with the corporate sector for channeling cor-porate sector funding into higher education. The idea is to tap resources to promote development, innovation and research. It envisages encouraging Indian corporate hous-es to endow funds to institutions in the country. This is to counter the current trend of big corporates endowing for-eign institutions with large funds.

This will be the focus in the Twelfth Five Year Plan. “This is a systematic attempt to articulate and conceive the role and participation of the corporate sector in higher education and the principles and guidelines that will determine it,” former UGC chairman Sukhdeo Thorat said. There has been a spectacular increase in private investment in education over the past 30 years.

Virtual Institute on Mathematics in B’lore30 Indian and 30 French mathematicians to work on research projects

Move to counter endowments to foreign varsities

with this, two international associated labs in informatics and immunology will also be established to strengthen scientific collaboration between the two nations.”

It has been decided that each country will invest Rs 5 crore towards the initia-tive. The funds would be spent over the next four years on joint research proj-ects in mathematical sciences. In the initial phase, 30 Indian and 30 French mathematicians will jointly work on research projects at IISc Bangalore and

CNRS Centres in Paris and Toulouse in France.

National Centre of Scien-tific Research (CNRS), France, is deeply involved in carrying out research in all areas of science, tech-nology and society through its 10 institutes, three of which have the status of national institutes.

Rs5 cr each country will invest in the initiative to be spent in

four years

Govt appoints Murthy to tap corporate funding for HE

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Viewpoint RS Grewal

Bolster Higher Education

Higher education in India has seen exponential growth since Indepen-dence, but, more so during the past two decades. A large number of problems related to regional imbalances, inter-social group disparities, enrolment rates, quality assurance and under-financing of higher education have come to the fore. Consequebtly, higher education has become an important theme of discourse at the national level. It is generally said that the whole process of higher education has become warped because of its sudden expansion and shrinking resources.

Shrinking Resources, expanding Demand In 1997, the Government of India declared that higher education was a ‘non-merit good’ , while elementary education was categorised as a ‘merit good’. Thus, higher education could not be subsidised by the state at the same level as ‘merit good’. The government now had to frame policies to provide alternative means to access higher education, even as the Indian demographic pattern created tremen-dous demand for higher education institutions.

Our administrators and the bureaucracy could not foresee this requirement

in time and were forced to accept private sector participation in higher education. Privatisation of higher education in India did not come about as a result of an ideological commitment, it was rather forced upon the nation.

The entry of private sector in higher education was seen with lot of scepticism by the regulatory bodies. They were suspicious of the monopolisa-tion of higher education by the private sector. The government gave its go-ahead, but the regulatory bodies treated the entry of private sector as a nec-essary ‘evil’. And geared up to deal with this ‘evil’. Rules and regulations that discriminated against private institutions were framed. For instance, the Association of Indian Universities adopted rules that prevents such universities from obtaining its membership till they complete five years of opera-tion. Despite the fact that private sector is the major education provider in the country, a pseudo ‘caste system’ has been created wherein public institutions, irrespective of their quality stan-dards, are generally rated a notch above them.

public perceptionThe general awareness of Indian public on regula-tory mechanism for higher education is rather

Instead of policing higher education, the government would do well to strengthen both the private and public higher education systems to counter the onslaught of foreign universities.


RS Grewal Viewpoint

“Instead of acting as policemen and pitting public universities against the private ones, our regulators would do well to complement their relative strengths”

poor. An average Indian is unable to distinguish between a state private university and a deemed to be university. The general public is not conversant with the roles and functions of some of the major regulatory bodies like the UGC and AICTE. Consequently, some of the statements issued by the regulators and the politicians create anxiety in the minds of people. The changed paradigm in higher education sector also complicates the scenario. Gradually, it has morphed from charity to an occupation. Some of the recent judicial pro-nouncements have described it as an ‘industry’. Indian courts have ruled that establishing and administering an educational institution for imparting knowledge to students is an occupa-tion, protected by Articles 19(1)(g) and 26(a) of the Constitution. But, the courts have also ruled that even though reasonable profit is permissible there should be no profiteering. At the international level the WTO has accepted that provision of education can be categorised as a service.

Regulatory MechanismLicence Raj is still flourishing in the higher educa-tion sector. It would not be an over-statement to say that Indian higher education sector is over-regulated but under-governed. Instead of an enabling regulatory mechanism we see a stifling environment that inhibits growth of the sector. Introduction of a bill in the Parliament to set up National Commission for Higher Education and Research that will subsume the UGC is a step in the right direction. Further, some of the states have set up their own regulatory commissions to oversee the functioning of only private universi-ties. Interestingly, the government owned univer-sities have been kept outside their ambit.

It is obvious that there exists a lack of mutual trust between the regulatory bodies and the private higher educational institutions. We need to learn from the experience of the European universities. Till the last decade of the 20th cen-tury, most of the governments in Europe were engaged in micro-managing the universities that inhibited the growth of the latter. On the other hand, the universities in the USA flourished because of the autonomy they enjoyed. Today, Indian higher education sector needs an enabling regulatory mechanism with an emphasis on self-regulation and an environment of mutual trust and respect.

Role of indian Middle Class The Indian middle class considers higher educa-

tion as the swiftest elevator to the pinnacles of opportunity and prosperity. But, access to the pub-licly funded higher educational institutions is severely limited. Logically, considerations related to social returns on higher education should prompt government policies to be driven by the needs of the middle class which are basically quality-education and affordable fees. Unfortu-nately, that has not happened. The policies adopt-ed so far have stymied the market responsiveness of higher education. Successive governments, try-ing to play on the sentiments of the middle class, have tried to regulate fees being charged by pri-vate education providers irrespective of the input costs and have spawned the coaching-centre industry. Consequently, the government policies instead of furthering the interests of the middle class have had exactly the opposite effect. Indian policymakers should be laying emphasis on qual-ity education and introducing measures that enhance the credibility of degrees awarded by Indian universities.

Learn from the pastIt is said that nations that do not learn from his-tory are condemned to repeat it. India has seen numerous invaders who came and exploited our national ethos of infighting. Now the foreign uni-versities are knocking at our doors. Instead of act-ing as policemen and pitting public universities against the private ones, our regulators would do well to complement their relative strengths and work on improving the quality of education.

Subscribe to the daily electronic newsletter from EDU at http://edu-leaders.com/content/newsletters

Author’s BIoAfter retiring from the army in 2002 Brig (Dr) RS Grewal, joined the Manipal Group, where he was Director of Sikkim Manipal Institute of Technology. Later he was the Pro-Vice Chancellor of Sikkim Manipal University and also the first Director of ICICI Manipal Academy. Presently he is the VC atChitkara University.

Viewpoint Dheeraj Sanghi


How to Select a Dean

For the top leader, a broad search is undertaken, often outside the institu-tion as well. This is hardly a perfect process, and often leaders who neither have vision nor leadership skills, are selected. But when one looks at the pro-cess of selecting the next rung of leadership, it is much worse — mainly internal and much narrower.

not Just an AdministratorIt is a common assumption that there is only one leadership position in an institution, and that deans and heads are administrative posts. Administra-tion is also considered to be an easy job that anyone with a good resume can do. Often these posts are a reward for good teaching and research work. It is also assumed that someone with experience in the system is best suited for the job, and therefore, candidates are to be found on the home turf. Loyalty to the leader is a paramount parameter in such selections. As a result, if you are lucky you get some good deans, and with others, you just pray that they won’t do too much damage in the three years that they would be occupying the office.

Apparently we need different selection criteria for deans. So, how should we go about it?

Spell out the RoleFirst of all, there must be proper articulation of the role of a dean. While one may generally be aware of what the responsibilities of say, a Dean of Students Affairs are, a document specifying the role would greatly help the search process. Further, the search committee should, in discussion with the stake-

holders, come out with a document explaining the specific focus that the institute expects from that office in the next couple of years. For example, if the goal of the institute is to privatise hostel mess-es, and you bring in a dean who is philosophically opposed to outsourcing, it is not going to help your goals. A list of immediate issues that one would have to handle would not only help poten-tial candidates but also the search committee.

List the Desirable VirtuesSecond, there is a need to think about the desirable profile. Not that a person outside this profile cannot be a good dean. But having a desir-able profile makes it easier to think of names to nominate and shortlist. For example, a dean of research and development, whose office is expect-ed to provide support to all project investigators, should be one who has handled several projects himself/herself. A dean of students affairs should be one who has handled student interaction either as a warden or in some other capacity. A dean of alumni affairs will have to be one who does not mind travelling and meeting a lot of people. And so on. The profile may include desirable past experience, age profile, interests, etc. Unfortu-nately, in most institutions, no profile is made available during the search process.

we are Looking for a LeaderThird, there has to be a realisation that a deanship is a leadership position. It is not about pushing files, but creating a vision for that office — sup-portive of the institution. The person should be

In Indian academic institutions, the process to select the director, principal or vice chancellor is often very different and much more rigorous than the process to select the next level of leadership, which includes deans and heads of departments

Viewpoint Dheeraj Sanghi


“The person should be full of ideas and creativity...inspiring and have good communication skills”

full of ideas and creativity. S/he should be inspir-ing and have good communication skills. One of the reasons for not finding leadership qualities in the director/VCs of our institution is that peo-ple with these qualities are not assigned the second rung of leadership roles and when we search for director/VC, there aren’t enough peo-ple with experience as a dean with these leadership qualities.

Look outFourth, unlike the search for director or VC, which looks at external candidates, there is hardly any institution in India that considers external candidates for a dean’s position. This must change. Leadership positions being filled by exter-nal candidates would bring in fresh ideas and new perspectives. This can only help institutions.

Often the argument against external deans is that an institution must promote its own people to senior positions, since everyone else is doing the same. If an institution were to recruit deans from outside, then its own faculty members will be denied the chance.

Only the institutions that are good or that aspire to be good can break this cyclic argument and show the way to others. And in any case, one is not saying that all second rung leadership posi-tions must be filled by external candidates. Any good institution will invariably find that it has excellent people to fill up some of these leadership positions.

Recruiting for leadership positions can become a tool to attract excellent people to an institution.

Be proactiveFifth, the search process should not just depend on nominations and applications. The search committee should be proactive in identifying the right set of persons and encouraging them to par-ticipate in the selection process. Good institutions do this all the time for faculty recruitment. But this step is necessary to recruit people at all levels, and is, in fact, even more important for leadership positions, where the persons may not be aware that a particular institution is searching for a dean.

why so Secretive?Sixth, in most cases, the process is very secretive. Not publicising a job description and a desirable profile are part of this secretive culture. It is impossible to find out who all were nominated, shortlisted, how the shortlisting was done, why someone was selected as a dean, etc. There is no

transparency at all. Instituting a more public pro-cess will result in better selection. All stakehold-ers must be aware of the candidates in the run-ning for the post. The shortlisted candidates may be asked to give a presentation on their vision and plans. All stakeholders, should be present at these presentations and in case they are made only to the search committee, videos should be made available to stakeholders later on.

My colleagues tell me that the secretive process is necessary since most faculty members in a good institute do not wish to become deans. If they have to go through a transparent process, they will simply refuse. On the other hand, if they are selected after a secretive process, then they think it is their duty to take up any role assigned to them by the institute. So the secretive process helps the institute in getting good deans. Nothing could be farther from reality. While I don’t deny that there are some faculty members who would agree to be a dean after a secretive process and wouldn’t have participated in a transparent process, but the number of such deans is small. Most faculty members who do not want to be an administrator will refuse to take up the role even after the secretive process. A lot of people who later turn out to be ineffective leaders as deans, wouldn’t have participated in the transparent process.

early Bird…Last, but not the least, search for leaders often takes a long time. And if one is looking for exter-nal candidates, they will not be able to move in very quickly. Hence it is important that the process starts at least six months in advance. The target should be to have the new dean in place about a month before the tenure of the current dean is over. It should be possible for the new dean to spend some time as dean-designate and observe how the previous dean carries out various tasks. This would enable smooth transi-tion of processes.

Author’s BIoDr Sanghi is the former director of Laxmi Narayan Mittal Institute of Information Technology, Jaipur. He is a professor of computer science at IIT, Kanpur. Dr Sanghi has a BTech in computer science from IIT Kanpur and an MS and a PhD from University of Maryland, USA . He can be reached at [email protected]

COVER STORY Foreign Collaboration


bY ChaRu bahRi & SmiTa pOliTE

Foreign universities are partnering with indian institutions to give indian students the much-needed global education. in time, hopefully these will also create knowledge centres of repute in the country

EastwardBoundInside18 I To Bill or Not to Bill

25 I Smooth sailing ahead —Anju Banerjee, Chairperson, EdCil

26 I Quest for knowledge beyond our shores—C.Raj Kumar, VC, OP Jindal Global University

28 I Destination India —Michael Russell, Cabinet Minister for Education and Lifelong Learning, Scotland


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try in the year 1947, when the dark years of being subservient to invading powers finally came to an end.

birth of CollaborationAs a new dawn arose over the country, free India began taking steps to establish advanced centres of learning, well aware that knowledge is vital to nation-building. For this, the newborn nation looked west-ward, where lay the best institutions of the modern world. The model of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) was adopted for the Indian Insti-tutes of Technology (IITs), conceived to hone some of the brightest minds pro-duced in the country. The premier man-agement institution of the country, Indi-an Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) initially collaborated with Har-vard Business School. Faculty from Har-vard helped set in place the curriculum, course design, style of governance, peda-gogy and research. Even when these early collaborations were not signed and sealed pacts, the spirit of association, the intention to imbibe best practices from leading institutions in the world, was evident.

In the first half century post Indepen-dence, collaborations in the business sphere let alone the education sector

Eirca 750 CE: Nalanda, once a nondescript town in the plains of Bihar, had grown in

stature over previous centuries by virtue of being home to the world’s first global residential university. Scholars from across the Indian subcontinent and other parts of the ancient world, particularly China, Greece and Persia, flocked to the sprawling complex to take their place among the 10,000 students and 2,000 teachers celebrating learning. The very name, Nalanda, meaning ‘insatiable in giving’, symbolised the era when India was perceived as a leading knowledge centre, as also a treasure trove for the wealth of its people. Till the 12th century, budding minds of Indian and foreign descent continued to make their way to the flourishing university in search of nourishment and direction. It was an age when India gave of itself more than what it imbibed from learning elsewhere.

Cut through to the early 20th century. Nalanda had long been relegated to the annals of history. A few flickering flames — the University of Mumbai, the Uni-versity of Madras, the University of Cal-cutta and so on — established in strong-holds of the British Raj, held up the torch of learning in India. Such was the state of the education sector in the coun-

were slow to grow. Some measure of support continued — for instance, US AID brought sought-after faculty from Berkeley, MIT, Princeton and other US universities to IIT Kanpur during the 60s. Overall, however, the Indian economy chugged along, expanding too sluggishly to capture the interest of the best Indian scholars leave aside attracting bright minds from abroad. Brain drain became the norm up until the 90s. Indians set great store on foreign education for they appreciate the experiential mode of learning imparted by overseas varsities. More often than not, studying abroad became a stepping stone to settling down there.

Collaboration boomCome the 90s, things began to change. As economic liberalisation swept the arena of trade and commerce, educational insti-tutions began to think differently as well. Learning would have to move out of country-specific silos and become increasingly global, to complement the emerging world economy. The outcome: a few path breaking collaborative agree-ments saw the light of day. The Interna-tional Centre for Applied Sciences at Manipal University was established in 1994 to run undergraduate engineering

To Bill or Not to Bill,That’sNot

TheQuestionThe Foreign universities bill maybe in a limbo. but that has not deterred foreign universities from exploring indian shores for lucrative partnerships and knowledge tie-ups


twinning programmes with partner uni-versities, initially, in USA. A few years later, Christ University in Bengaluru part-nered with the Western Michigan Univer-sity, Kalamazoo, USA, to offer a bache-lor’s in business administration (BBA). That was only the start of it. Since the turn of the millennium, collaboration has emerged as the new buzzword. Every for-eign university worth its salt is expressing an interest in a tie-up of some sort with an Indian institution.

The burgeoning education sector is seeing an unprecedented gap between demand and supply. Realising this, over-seas institutions are seeking a share of the ever-growing pie. But prevailing laws exclude foreign universities from offer-ing a degree programme in India. Add to this the Indian penchant for foreign edu-cation, which Dr Sankaran P Raghuna-than, Dean of The National Manage-ment School, Chennai cites as “the foremost reason why the country is see-ing an increase in collaborations between foreign and Indian institu-tions.” Also, the huge number of stu-dents precluded from travelling overseas for further studies by the high cost of education, and India’s stated mission to triple its higher education enrolment ratio by 2020. There is enough to attract foreign universities to establish a foot-print in the Indian education sector.

Eastward ahoyOP Jindal Global University alone boasts of collaborations with 18 universities including the leading lights of the global education sector. The University of Delhi has MoUs with 74 universities spanning the world. Looking at the spate of growth in collaborations, it appears as though India is fast closing the gap to come full circle. Indian students traditionally headed westward in search of quality education. Now, coveted universities offering the best learning experiences are keen to collaborate, not only to share their practices to bring Indian institu-tions up to scratch but also to create opportunities for their students to learn about India, an emerging economic power to reckon with. “We want our stu-dents and faculty to have the opportunity

to learn about the history, culture and economy of India as they prepare for the next few decades,” says Dr Robert L Tay-lor, Professor of Management and Dean Emeritus, Director of International Programmes, College of Business, University of Louisville (UofL). In that sense, collaboration is following the greater economic well-being of the country. Anton Muscatelli, Vice Chancel-lor of the University of Glasgow was part of the high-level Scottish delegation rep-resenting 13 of Scotland’s 16 universities including Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aber-deen, Dundee, Strathclyde, Stirling, Glasgow Caledonian, Edinburgh Napier, etc. The group attended the FICCI high-

er education summit in November 2011, led by Michael Russell, Scottish Cabinet Minister for Education and Lifelong Learning. Speaking of the drivers of col-laboration by universities on the world stage, Muscatelli said, “I think it’s actu-ally similar drivers that drive interna-tional trade. It’s the fact that there are increasingly same areas of research and economies of scale. You need to work together simply because of the complexi-ties of the problems involved, especially when you’re dealing with global chal-lenges. But also because there are com-monalities of scope, there are distinctive areas of expertise which each country complement each other.” Dr Peter Downes, Vice Chancellor, University of Dundee, another member of the team, expressed an interest in multi-partied party partnerships. That is, engaging with universities well linked through industrial and commercial contracts.

India is nowadays playing host to a steady stream of delegations represent-ing foreign universities not wanting to be left out of the globalisation of the Indian education sector. The Scottish delegation aimed at establishing some collaboration during its visit. That hap-pened: the University of Aberdeen tied up with the University of Petroleum and Energy Studies and the Sikkim Manipal University and Edinburgh Napier Uni-versity will be working together.

A few days prior to these deliberations, IIM Bangalore hosted a seven-member delegation of envoys from ASEAN coun-tries, led by the High Commissioner of Brunei Darussalam HE Dato Paduka Haji Sidek Ali. The visitors were explor-ing the possibility of a tie-up with IIM Bangalore in the field of professional management education.

A few months earlier, a delegation from the University of Dayton, Ohio, led by Joseph Saliba, provost, visited Delhi Technological University to explore the possibility of collaboration between the two institutions. Interactions with the vice chancellor, heads of the depart-ments and deans of the university helped the teams identify common areas of interest. Such visits, for the sake of collaboration, are an ongoing affair.

“Though we collaborate and

interact with several local partners, Fuqua’s

Global Consulting Practicum is not

currently in an official partnership with an Indian university”

—Erin WorshamCASE Managing Director, Center for

the Advancement of SocialEntrepreneurship , Duke University


Foreign Collaboration COVER STORY

collaborations. However, the internation-al committee tries to work together to raise the profile of what we’re doing indi-vidually as well as collectively."

Of all the collaborative agreements, the concept of twinning has become the most popular among students. It’s been around for close to two decades now. This joint education model is also pre-ferred by many foreign institutions. Dr Taylor of the UofL, which offers an MBA programme in association with the National Management School of Chen-nai, attributes this inclination to the value added by the local partner. “UofL’s local partner, NMS, can help us develop perspectives from inside the subconti-nent that will make our international focus more meaningful,” he says.

Twining programme students com-plete some part of a joint programme in India and subsequently transfer over-seas to the affiliated foreign university for the remaining semesters. The degree is awarded by the overseas partner after the student successfully completes the programme. Partnerships between Indi-

an and overseas educational institutions to offer twinning programmes are bring-ing more students within the ambit of global education at a fraction of the cost.

popular Twinning programmesExamples of twinning programmes abound with most being designed to offer sought-after degrees in India, such as BBA and MBA. Schulich has entered the India education market with a twin-ning arrangement with Mumbai’s SP Jain Institute of Management and Research. Charmaine Courtis, Executive Director of Student Services of the Schulich School of Business estimates that there are about 250,000 individuals interested in learning business manage-ment at this point in time. Many of these are youth desirous of gaining a qualifica-tion that will carry them far once they enter the workforce. “This demand in the backdrop of the limited availability of business education in India attracted Schulich to India. The handful of top business schools in the country can in

Collaboration modelsTwo years ago, when the cabinet cleared the Foreign Educational Institutions Bill, the hype created around the Bill led wishful thinkers to believe that they would soon witness the laying of the foundation stone of a Harvard or Oxford in India. The Bill is yet to be made into legislation and frankly, there is no telling how the proposed regulation will play out. But its absence is by no means slow-ing down the collaborative engine. Edu-cation franchises; distance education tie-ups; alliances to share faculty, course designs, curricula and resources; associ-ations to conduct joint research; and partnerships to offer joint programmes were a reality before the Bill was pro-posed. They will continue to multiply on the back of compelling drivers.

Dame Joan Stringer, Vice Chancellor of the Edinburgh Napier University, chairs the International Committee for Scotland’s Universities. A part of the Scottish delegation visiting in Novem-ber, she said, "There is no overall single model or strategy that we adhere to for

Nalanda FlourishingScholars from across the Indian subcontinent as from other parts of the ancient world, particularly China, Greece and Persia, flocked to the sprawling complex to take their place among the 10,000 students and 2,000 teachers celebrating learning

Destruction of NalandaTurkic Muslim invaders led by Bakhtiyar Khilji, ransacked and destroyed the university driving away the monks. The libraries at Nalanda are reported to have kept burning for three months after they were set on fire

The Dark AgesThe period from 1193 to 1835 was not very noticeable for any landmarks in higher education. While individual efforts continued India had been long removed from the world map of education destination

globAl coNNecT: India’s Ties with World Education

750ce 1193 1193-1835



no way cater to the growth in demand for business education.” What’s more, Schulich believes that its global mandate perfectly matches the current needs of the country. “Schulich is Canada’s Glob-al Business School; it has an interest in and commitment to developing students with a global focus because ‘global’ best describes the inherent nature of busi-ness today. India needs global leaders

ence the programme together. This works for the development of profes-sional skills like team-building, prob-lem-solving and leadership.” The twin-ning model also fulfils students’ desire for an overseas experience and placement abroad.

Some overseas institutions are offer-ing degrees tailored to the profile of well-known segments of the global Indian workforce. For instance, India is known for having exported some of the best minds to the information technology industry in the US. In keeping with this reality, Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) has partnered with SSN School of Advanced Software Engineering (SSN SASE), a member of the SSN group of institutions in Chennai, to launch a Mas-ters of Science in Information Technolo-gy-Software Engineering (MSIT-SE) degree programme. Dr David Garlan, Professor in the Institute for Software Research and the School of Computer Science at CMU, and the Director of Pro-fessional Software Engineering Pro-grammes sees the course as “a means to

and can produce global leaders of world-class quality.”

Twinning programmes best fit streams of learning combining practice and theo-ry such as business administration. Affirms Charmaine Courtis, Executive Director of Student Services of the Schulich School of Business, “Students learn best in a classroom situation. There, they can learn, work and experi-

english education ActLord Thomas Babington Macaulay delivers “Minute on Education” laying the foundation of English as a mode of instruction in higher education. This new system of education, which is commonly believed to be aimed at producing clerks, came into being in 1854

Twinning Takes offUniversities in India started to seek out foreign partners for coming up with Twinning programmes, both for improving curriculum and attracting students

Foreign help for establishing institutes of excellenceThe Government accepts recommendations of the Sircar Committee and decides to establish Institutes of Technology with the assistance of countries like USSR, the USA, UK and West Germany. Planning Commission in 1959 invites Professor George Robbins of the University of California to help in setting up an All India Institute of Management

collaboration boomForeign collaborations grow by leaps and bounds. With single universities like the University of Delhi boasting of MoUs with 74 universities. Foreign universities start sending delegations to seek out indian partners instead of just a one way flow, collaboration starts to become two way

—Dr Sankaran P RaghunathanDean, National Management School, Chennai

“Indian penchant for foreign education, is the foremost reason why the country is seeing a greater number of collaborations between foreign and Indian institutions”

1835 1950s 1990s 2000-2012



sultants India Limited Anju Banerjee believes that competition (be it from twinning programmes) bodes well for the Indian education sector. “It would improve the teaching infrastructure as the qualification requirements of collab-orating Indian institutions is expected to match overseas standards.”

Indeed, Janet Brown, Chief Executive Research Scottish Qualifications Author-ity, member of the Scottish delegation, expressed an interest in working with newly established universities, “to help them with their quality assurance sys-tems and provide joint certification that basically gives them a quality badge as they start developing.” Such qualifica-tion would get the new universities on the world stage and give them the credi-bility they need to attract students.

Another potential but less talked about outcome of twinning programmes is the possibility of such courses to attract for-

foreign partner may actively participate in assessing and grading students. For instance, Carnegie Mellon is involved in every aspect of the MSIT-SE programme. For this very reason, Dr Shashikant Albal, Director, SSN School of Advanced Software Engineering, believes twinning programmes are win-win propositions. “The infrastructure used to teach stu-dents at SSN SASE meets global stan-dards and the course content is from CMU. But the education is more eco-nomical than pursuing a postgraduate degree in software engineering in the US alone.” Cost-effectiveness aside, stu-dents gain from a deeper understanding of India and the country of the partner-ing institution, in this case, the States. An exposure to two economies in turn enhances students’ job-worthiness.

Looking at the wider picture, from an Indian perspective, Chairperson and Managing Director of Educational Con-

reach out to top-notch Indian students and influence the state of practice of soft-ware engineering.” Students spend the first year of this specially designed 18-month full-time residential pro-gramme at SSN SASE, where they are taught using CMU courseware and evalu-ated by SSN SASE as well as CMU facul-ty. Then, they transfer to CMU in Pitts-burgh, US for the remaining two semesters and the award of the final degree.

Win-win propositionsIn effect, twinning programmes allow students a transfer of credits gained dur-ing study time in India. Prior to signing the MoU, the overseas institution assures itself that the Indian partner is fully geared up to adhere to quality stan-dards. The infrastructure and the faculty available to deliver the programme are critically reviewed. Even thereafter, the

Delegation: (L to R) Pete Downes, VC, University of Dundee; Janet Brown, Chief Executive, Scottish Qualifications Authority; Petra Wend, VC, Queen Margaret University; Michael Russell, Scottish Cabinet Minister for Education &

Lifelong Learning; Dame Joan Stringer, VC, Edinburgh Napier University; Anton Muscatelli, VC, University of Glasgow

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eign students to study in India (and thus, foreign exchange). Such students would gain from being exposed to Indi-an business and culture as well as incur lesser costs for their education. If this trend takes off, it would truly liberalise the Indian education sector and take the country a few steps in the right direction, towards being the centre of learning it

Adds Dr Taylor, “Collaborative pro-grammes have the potential to work both ways, attract Indian students to US and American students to India.” But the massification, as it were, of joint pro-grammes depends on Indian universi-ties working their way through equiva-lence, the biggest issue standing in the way of more twinning arrangements.

once was.Banerjee is of the opinion that in the

coming years, twinning programmes may make a small dent in the huge mis-match between the number of foreign students in India — about a paltry 10,000 — and the number of Indian stu-dents going overseas for study — approximately over 2.5 lakh.

The Indian growth story is unfolding a new set of opportunities for overseas educational institutions. Corporate education is another

area that is seeing a fair amount of interest from foreign players, especially those that have already signed MoUs with one or more Indian partners. When two institutions agree to partner each other in progress, the aim becomes to collaborate at every possible level. “Carnegie Mellon University sees its MoU with SSN (also) as a way to reach out directly to Indian IT companies to help them improve their software engineering capabilities through short courses, and non-degree offerings,” adds Dr David Garlan, Professor, Institute for Software Research and the School of Computer Science at CMU, and the Director of Professional Software Engineering Programmes.

Another exemplary collaborative arrangement aiming at serving corporate clients is a partnership between the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad and Duke University’s Duke Corporate Education in 2006. Both partners are leveraging their resources and capabilities to develop and deliver customised education programmes to enable clients such as Aditya Birla Group, Aircel, Genpact and the State Bank of India, effect corporate strategy. Speaking about the why and how of this alliance, Nikhil Raval, Managing Director for India, Duke Corporate Education, says, “Duke Corporate Education wants to serve clients in places that matter in the world. Places that have an impact now or in the future. India is clearly a place that will

impact the future. A collaborative arrangement works best in the corporate education space as it allows Duke Corporate Education to be Indian as well as global.”

Outside of the corporate sector, collaborations are also aiming at making a positive impact on the quality of professions of social importance. An agreement between the Jindal Global Law School, OP Jindal Global University and the University of Cambridge exemplifies a MoU designed to enhance the practice of policing in India. “We are collaborating with Cambridge University to jointly train senior IPS officers in evidence-based policing. We perceive collaboration as a means to do much more than merely offer hundreds of students a global education,” opines Professor C Raj Kumar, Vice Chancellor of OP Jindal Global University and Dean, Jindal Global Law School.

GettingCorporates

Aboard Collaborations help provide a global corporate education rooted in local realities


Equivalence: playing SpoilsportAt present, differences between the Indi-an and American education models stand in the way of twinning programmes designed to attract more foreign students to the country. Banerjee says, “India lags behind in matching its teaching pro-grammes with the American semester system. Some Indian universities do not follow the semester system. Also, they offer rigidly structured courses. In con-trast, overseas universities offer courses that are flexible by virtue of being modu-lar in design. Matching a course module by module makes it easier to establish guidelines to assess students. Brazil, a BRIC country has been able to do so and is welcoming a greater number of exchange students as a result. As things stand, overseas students perceive time spent in India as wasted as they earn no credits for the Indian experience.”

In time, as more foreign varsities engage in India, by and large with pri-vate institutions, existing Indian univer-sities will be compelled to get their act together. According to Banerjee, “They must critically review the quality of their infrastructure as well as assess the soft features of the courses they offer, includ-ing the design of the course curriculum, the delivery model, and the flexibility in choosing subjects.”

Indian universities must also under-stand that overseas institutions with an interest in offering their students an India experience will make their own arrangements for this purpose, indepen-dent of the backing of any local educa-tional institution. Duke University for instance, is deeply engaged in study and research in the fields of public policy, medicine, business, the arts, etc., in India without having a campus of its own or a twinning arrangement. In rec-ognition of the value of an India experi-ence, Duke’s Fuqua School of Business offers students of Duke MBA (daytime programme), the Global Consulting Practicum, a six-credit field study course run by Duke’s Centre for the Advance-ment of Social Entrepreneurship (CASE). Students work in small consult-ing teams, supervised by faculty, and

evaluations, and input from the Indian social venture.”

Undergraduate students at Duke Uni-versity can also opt for an in-depth India experience via the Global Semester Abroad or the Duke Semester in India and earn academic credits for this expo-sure. These two programmes are taught by faculty members from Duke’s San-ford School of Public Policy Studies, the Department of Cultural Anthropology, and the Duke Global Health Institute. A more proactive approach on the part of Indian universities would perhaps open doors for collaborations with overseas inst i tut ions to run experient ia l learning modules.

Dealing with different cultures of edu-cating and of teaching, was also one of the points that a member of the Scottish delegation Petra Wend, Vice Chancellor of Queen Margaret University, Edin-burgh talked about. "We offer a lot of staff development and invite Indian staff to come to the University for staff devel-opment weeks. It’s clearly a challenge but a very rewarding challenge and we learn a lot from each other."

Towards Evolved modelsCollaborative education models, includ-ing twinning, will evolve in the future. The experience gained by Indian institu-tions engaging in such arrangements will create better options for students. Dr Rag-hunathan’s learning from the past few years of offering collaborative pro-grammes, which include a 1+1 year MBA course offered in association with the University of Louisville, USA, is leading him to push the boundary of collabora-tion further. “A twinning programme has benefits. But it also has drawbacks. At the end of the study period in India, students must continue the programme with the affiliated overseas university. They do not get to choose a university of their choice in the USA. Also, a student has nothing to show for the time spent studying in India, no diploma or a degree. Moreover, students cannot choose a field to major in; they are restricted by the choice offered by the Indian university.”

With the aim of eliminating the draw-backs of current twinning programmes

visit and interact with social entrepre-neurs and businesses serving base-of-the-pyramid markets in India. Students spend six weeks in initial research and preparation at Fuqua, followed by 12 days in the field. Erin Worsham, CASE Managing Director, clarifies, “Though we collaborate and interact with several local partners, Fuqua’s Global Consult-ing Practicum is not currently in an offi-cial partnership with an Indian univer-sity. Students are given grades based on a variety of assignments from Fuqua, including the team’s final report to the social venture; and on their individual contributions to the project, which is determined by faculty observation, peer

"Younger, smaller programmes that are

looking for a connection with

American institutions match

our profile. Size matters less for us in

the early stages because we hope to

begin small and scale up to becoming a

significant provider"—David Moore

AVP for International Education, SACS COC Liaison, Broward

College, USA



and to open up the American education sector to Indian students, as well as the Indian education sector to American stu-dents, the NMS has entered into an arrangement with Broward College, an accredited four-year college in Florida, to offer a two year Associate of Arts (AA) degree programme in India. The AA is a 60 college credit study course in general

Frankly, it is premature to opine on the shape the foreign universities Bill takes and hence on the impact on the engagement model of foreign

universities in India. What is certain is that greater col-laboration between Indian institutes and foreign univer-sities is inevitable, given the huge interest in India for overseas education and the bright future of the Indian education sector. Estimates suggest that about 120,000 Indian students enter US universities and 80,000 stu-dents make their way to UK annually. An equal number of students are interested in studying abroad but are held back by monetary constraints. This shows the immense scope for courses of reputed foreign universi-ties in India.

It remains to be seen whether foreign universities entering the Indian education sector will go the brick and mortar way. The education sector is abuzz with the possibility of overseas varsities setting up campuses in the country. I feel they will need to be incentivised by sops in the shape of tax breaks, subsidised land in education SEZs etc., to establish a physical establishment in the country. On the other hand, they may see greater benefit in delivering courses in virtual classrooms or in partnering Indian institutes. The delivery model will be driven to some extent by the kind of course being offered. Distance learning usually works well only for theoretical courses.

At present, it appears that soft partnerships are likely

to become more popular. This involves adapting an overseas curriculum to Indian conditions and collaborating with an existing institute for delivery. Still, several business models could emerge.

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education and a concentration in a spe-cific area. After earning an associate’s degree from NMS, the graduate has the option of transferring the credits to a bachelor’s degree programme of a pre-ferred US university, subject to the stu-dent’s GPA and the university’s admis-sion policies. “It’s a step towards an open sort of collaboration,” says Dr Rag-

hunathan, who hopes the new endeav-our will also cater to more foreign stu-dents. “Overseas students could make major savings on the first two years of their college education. An AA degree from NMS costs less than US$ 25,000 vis-à-vis US$ 60,000 in USA, with no compromise on education quality and standards.”

Anju BanerjeeChairperson and Managing Director of Educational

Consultants India Ltd (EdCIL)

anju banerjee expresses her views on engagement models that are likely to prevail in future

SmoothSailing Ahead



NMS’ tie-up with Broward College shows that there is scope for newer entrants in the education sector to forge ahead. Contrary to the belief that well-established universities will be the path-breakers in offering new education mod-els, Dr David D Moore, AVP for International Education, SACS COC Liaison, Broward College, USA, points out that a leading institution is less likely to be interested in creating the kind of innovative affiliations Broward College has established around the world. “Younger, smaller programmes that are looking for a connection with American institutions match our profile. Size mat-ters less for us in the early stages because we hope to begin small and scale up to becoming a significant provider of American educational programming with NMS. This will become a viable option for students in India who are not able to make their way to the United States for a college degree programme. We are interested in the quality of leader-ship and academic credentials of the partner institution, the faculty, the cali-bre of the administrative team, and the overall emphasis on quality. Our outlook should converge on these aspects for us to share American programming as the content,” he says.

David Beeby, VP International for Glasgow Caledonian University, part of the Scottish delegation that visited India last November, describes the process of identifying a potential partner as a match up of “academic and research interests” because there exists “almost like a cul-ture on both sides. It is a matter of look-ing to see where the joint interests are over a period of time.”

Comparing Joint programmesThe outcome of collaboration is a pletho-ra of study options for the student com-munity to evaluate and choose from. Con-cerns have arisen about the possibility of students falling for substandard pro-grammes in a crowded marketplace. Some collaborative programmes award diplomas, others award degrees. Does the final award make a difference to students’ prospects? And is there a common yard-

C Raj KumarVice Chancellor, OP Jindal Global University and Dean,

Jindal Global Law School

stick to rate comparable programmes? What matters most for the beneficiary of education?

Dr Raghunathan is of the opinion that only students desiring to study further, say pursue a doctorate, would prefer a degree course. Students aiming at enhancing their employability usually do not differentiate between courses offer-ing a diploma or degree. They prioritise programmes based on the quality of edu-cation imparted, exposure gained and job prospects. In fact, he feels the huge number of students opting for applied

streams of knowledge such as manage-ment sets the greatest store on the ability of a programme to offer them rewarding employment. “They use the quality of placement services as a measure of col-laborative offerings. Programmes that ‘guarantee’ them a job are considered the best. Any foreign programme merely promising a ‘foreign’ label without a placement would not go down well with students. It would be seen as a gimmick, a mere eyewash.”

By this measure, students desirous of pursuing job opportunities in the coun-



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bright minds to learn in its institutions, collaboration would more than have served its purpose. Frankly, we are not likely to see an Indian Harvard or Yale take root anytime soon, if not ever.

What we can expect from all the forms of collaboration is for the Indian educa-tion system to reinvent itself. Learning, after all, is the essence of education, be it at the level of a country, or a univer-sity or an individual.

A Nalanda might well be in the mak-ing, right here, right now, with some help from foreign universities.

O P Jindal Global University was founded in recog-nition of the impact of globalisation on law, busi-ness, international affairs and public policy. Glo-

balisation is changing the way we perceive the world and our place within the scheme of things. Significantly, it is allowing students to think and look beyond India. But our youth must be able to access global education to right-fully take their place in the emerging new world order. This vision is what drives OP Jindal Global University and explains why we have entered into over twenty different forms of international collaborations with leading univer-sities like Yale, Harvard, Cornell, Michigan, Cambridge, and so on. Our aim from day one has been to establish a global curriculum, offer courses and programmes rele-vant in the global context, delivered by global faculty, who engage and lead students in conducting global research and promote global interaction.

Our international collaborative engagements are designed to ensure that each relationship has direct impact and is substantive in nature. Some forms of collaboration are organising joint conferences with Oxford, Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Cornell, Brown and other global universities; appointing faculty members from the best universities as visiting faculty and so on.

Our broad collaborative relationship with the Indiana University ties its different schools with each of our schools. We recognise that in spite of having over 400 universities and 25,000 affiliated colleges, India lacks knowledge-creating institutions that promote cutting-edge research. This is something we can learn from foreign universities.

The world over, knowledge-creating institutions are designing solutions for current social and business problems as well as identifying future challenges. Leading universities of the world are known for their cutting-edge research into pressing issues. India must join Asian nations like Japan, South Korea, Singapore and China, including Hong Kong, all of which boast of institutions that are contributing to creation of knowledge. This is why each of our agreements with overseas universities has a research component. Learning from with the 1:10 faculty-student ratio at globally renowned universities such as Yale and Harvard, we are maintaining a ratio of 1:15 to encourage our faculty to engage in research. We seek to bring the best practices of the best educational institutions to India, to raise the bar of research and academics in the country. Collaboration is a step towards it.

try of the affiliated university would judge twinning programmes based on the quality of placement services offered on completion overseas. In this context, software engineering students would highly rate the SSN SASE-CMU joint programme because they would avail of the strong placement service run by CMU after successfully completing the course. Recent postgraduates have been placed in leading fortune 100 global corporations.

Another measure of the value of a col-laborative course is the nature and dura-

tion of the agreement. In the eventuality of running out of its term, it must still provide for the completion of the course by students who are partially through it. Otherwise, students would find them-selves in the lurch. Long-standing col-laborations indicate the genuine inten-tion of both collaborators to add value to the field of education.

If the path of collaboration can help India reinstate its position as a knowl-edge centre of the world, if a Nalanda of the modern age emerges from the sea of tie-ups, if the country ends up attracting

C Raj Kumar talks about why globalisation of education spells

the way forward for india

Quest forKnowledgeBeyond Our

Shores



The delegation of Scottish academic heads that I am leading this time is cer-tainly the most high-powered and high profile ones to ever come to India. Scotland has a high degree of competence in education. What we lack compe-

tence in is international relations. We have to develop it to match our vision for our country’s development. I am a member of a government that is ambitious for full independence of Scotland. It’s our policy, and we’ll be holding a referendum on it in the second part of our third parliamentary term. So, we have prioritised our work in various parts of the globe and one of the big areas for our work is India. We have a long standing relationship with India since around 1871. As nations, we also share a pas-sion for education. You can see a glimpse of the educational excellence that exists within Scotland from this delegation. In a nation of five million people, we have five of the world’s top 200 universities — which is quite unique. In terms of per head of population, we have more world class universities than any other nation. We have almost one-and-a-half per cent of the world’s research citations though we account for just 0.07 per cent of the world’s popu-lation. This makes us the most cited nation per head of population. And that’s not an accident. This is the work of many years. One of the most ancient Scottish universities,


MichAel russell

Born: Bromley, Kent, 1953

designation: Cabinet Minister for Education and Lifelong Learning

political career: Elected to the Scottish Parliament in 1999 as a Regional Member for South of Scotland. Founding member of the Parliamentary Bureau and then served as Shadow Minister for Children, Education and Culture. He won 'Debater of the Year' award in 2000 and was shortlisted for 'Scottish Politician of the Year' title in 2002

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michael Russell, Scottish Cabinet minister for Education and lifelong learning, on Scotland's india plans

Destination India


St Andrews, celebrates its 600th anniver-sary this year. Five of our universities were established before the year 1600. We have established 16 universities and 500 institutes of higher learning in our country. We view our educational relationships worldwide in three ways: Our first focus is exchange of students — both international students to come in and Scottish students to go out. We’ve got something like 4,000 Indian stu-dents studying in Scotland, which is about eight per cent of our international students. International students make up 14 per cent of the total students in Scotland and we want this number to grow. But, the second part is equally important for us. I’d like to see more Scottish students studying in India. It’s been a constant theme during my visit this time. All universities I have visited have raised the issue of how we could encourage Scottish students to spend time in India. The second part is partnerships. The legal framework in India is still develop-ing, of course, but each of the institu-tions in this delegation would wish to enter into some form of partnership or other in terms of having a presence in India and developing new types of provi-sions. This isn’t about anybody coming with their suitcase of courses already packed saying,“Here it is”. It’s about developing provisions for the 21st cen-tury in different circumstances and for different people. And I am sure that is an ambition which doesn’t hurt. The third area is research. Research is high priority in Scotland, and that means research collaborations are at the highest level with the very best in the world. Scotland started this system of research pooling, which is bringing universities together to share their excellence. This has huge potential to carry on develop-ing outside the bounds of Scotland and England. So we can lay these three very clear possibilities on the table for serious discussion. However, this is not the start of anything new. People who are here have been here before. Each of the insti-tutions in the delegation has started dis-cussions with one set of institutions or

another. I witnessed an MoU signing between Aberdeen University and the University of Petroleum and Energy Studies. Two years ago when I was here, I witnessed the first of the MoUs. We have a huge set of possibilities in front of us which we’re very keen to fulfil. The best ambassadors for Scottish higher education are not actually in this delegation and that’s not putting down my colleagues. They are actually the Indian students who have studied in Scotland. I met a number of interesting people at our alumni reception last night. One of them was a young lady who is managing a very large hotel in Mumbai. She had done a two-year course in Scotland and now wants to ensure that others have the same oppor-tunity within India. We had a positive discussion about how that would devel-op. Now that struck me as very practical and very interesting. As far as the Foreign University Bill goes, I discussed the Bill two years ago with the minister and I’m discussing it again now. This is an internal matter for India, and it’s not our place to interfere in internal politics. It will be up to the Indian Government what passage the Bill has and what it finally looks like. But it will be taken up — I am absolutely cer-

tain of that. I would be very surprised indeed if there weren’t universities in Scotland that would regard the passage of the Bill as immensely advantageous. For example Heriot-Watt has a campus in Dubai and it may have other campus-es shortly. I cannot imagine that Watt would not be interested in a similar move in India. If you take the example of Strathclyde, it is interesting. Opportuni-ties abound even without the Bill. Per-haps they’re more difficult to find, but they are there, and that is what educa-tionists from both sides are working towards. But, the fewer barriers there are to this development, the better it is. We also had an MoU in place with Associa-tion of Indian Universities (AIU) which we’re now moving towards the MoA. So I’ll be talking to the new director general to see what progress we can make on that. We’ve been having some discus-sions over the past two years, in fact. And, if the Bill is passed, depending on its provisions, and the ease with which institutions can invest in India, I think the link with the AIU will be very advantageous.

India is at the heart of our plans for the education sector and I hope we see a few more collaborations between the two countries in the next few years.

—Michael RussellCabinet Minister for

Education and Lifelong Learning, Scotland

"We have prioritised our work in various

parts of the globe and one of the big areas

for our work is India. We have a long

standing relationship with India since around 1871. As

nations, we also share a passion for

education"



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could WE

havE savEd

Malini MurMu?

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eDU sets out to investigate how institutions

of higher education can prevent incidents of

student suicides

by Mitia Nath & MaNjiri iNdurkar

Counselling adMiNiStratiON


could WE

havE savEd

Malini MurMu?

Malini Murmu was a first year student at IIM Bangalore. On September 20, 2011, her body was found hanging from the ceiling fan of her hostel room. Her suicide note stated: “He ditched me. This is the best I can do to take revenge.” The note and the sui-cide were in response to a ‘break-up’ with her boyfriend. Her boyfriend, Abhishek Dhan, had allegedly dumped her on Facebook.

On July 25, 2011, Pankaj Chowdhury, a final year student of Metallurgy at IIT Kharag-pur, hanged himself in his hostel room. His body was discovered by his friend.

Nitin Kumar Reddy, 22, a final year student of Mechanical Engineering at IIT Madras, ended his life on May 5, 2011, in his hostel room. This came after he was told by the depart-ment head that his poor performance will prevent him from graduating along with his batch mates.

What is common in these suicides? Not much, except the fact that: a) they are all students; b) they all belong to elite educational institutions of the country; and c) they have ended their lives over rather trivial reasons.

What is noteworthy is the number of such incidents — students of best colleges of the country, with possibly great futures to look forward to, committing suicides.

Captain Mukesh baveja has been appointed as Vice Chancellor of Indian Maritime University, Chennai. He succeeds KM Vijayan, who was the first Vice Chancellor of the University. Baveja was the head of Indian National Base Centre, Sea Farers Mumbai. He holds the position of Director in-charge, IMU Kandla Port complex. After this appointment, he would hold additional charge of both the positions. The Indian Maritime University, is the first of its kind in the country catering to the educational requirement of the maritime fraternity. It was established in 2008 by an Act of Parliament and is the only Central University for maritime education.

appointment | Indian maritime University

Capt Mukesh baveja to be VC of iMu

ADMIN SNIppetS

New AppoINtMeNt• Indian Maritime University• National University of Judicial Sciences• Institute of Management Studies, Ghaziabad


adMiNiStratiON Counselling

Despite the absence of concrete statistics to show the exact number or percentage of students committing suicides each year, it is not difficult to gather that there has been a sharp rise in student suicides over the last few years. So much so that alarm bells are going off in several edu-cational institutions of the country with many of them putting in place mecha-nisms to slay the monster before it gets any bigger.

reining-in the Monster“We try to deal with the problem at the

panic stage, not the final one”, says Dr Preeti Dhawan, psychologist and coun-sellor at Lady Shri Ram College, New Delhi. ‘The problem’ here, clearly being the increasing emotional disorders among students, which when aggravat-ed, can lead to suicidal tendencies. According to Dhawan, there are efforts being made to curb high stress levels, anxiety and depression among students. “There are two on-campus counsellors and our names are displayed on notice boards to make students aware of our services. Moreover, all our faculty mem-

bers are very approachable and try their best to handle students’ problems at their own level,” adds Dhawan.

Mumbai’s KJ Somaiya Institute of Management Studies and Research too, lays high importance on teacher-student interaction. “The atmosphere in our col-lege is a congenial one. We have a men-toring system in place, which involves regular interactions between students and teachers. Right from the orientation stage, students are groomed in a way so as to make them understand that com-peting for marks alone is futile, if it is not accompanied by holistic develop-ment”, says its Director, Dr Satish Aila-wadi. The institute also takes assistance of a psychometric test to ensure that it admits only those students who are emo-tionally capable of withstanding the pressures of studying in an elite college. The methods seem to be successful. In spite of not having a campus counsellor, Dr Ailawadi reports that in the 30-year-old history of the college, there hasn’t been a single case of suicide or attempted suicide.

Other colleges, too, are devising their own methods to tackle stress and related disorders, like nervous breakdown, among students. Xavier’s Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar, for instance, runs a mandatory course called Emotional Intelligence. “This course is part of our regular curriculum. In the first year itself students are divided into

dr P ishwara bhat, has been appointed as the Vice Chancellor (VC) of NUJS, Kolkata replacing the outgoing VC Prof MP Singh. Dr Bhat was a professor at the University of Mysore and then Dean of Faculty of Law for three terms and acting Vice Chancellor for four months.He has been a Fulbright Nehru Visiting Professor in 2010 and has also taught NPO Law at Columbus Law School of

Catholic University of America, Washington DC. He has also been a visiting professor at Queen’s University, Kingston, Canada. Prof Bhat is a well known scholar with a specialisation in Constitutional Law. He has authored several books as well as research articles in legal journals of international and national repute.

appointment | National University of judicial Sciences

P ishwara bhat to replace MP Singh as NujS VC

“The Emotional Intelligence course which encourages students to discuss their problems is mandatory at our institute” — Father PT josephDirector, XImB


Counselling adMiNiStratiON

Subscribe to the daily electronic newsletter from EDU at http://edu-leaders.com/con-tent/newsletters

“It is the pressure that students are facing from all quarters. This kind of pressure to perform was non-existent even a decade ago” — johnson thomasFounder Director, aasra, NGO

groups of seven, and encouraged to dis-cuss their problems. When students find others going through similar crises, they cease to feel miserable about themselves. This group acts as a support group,” says Father PT Joseph, Director, XIMB.

a Global ChallengeIt appears that support groups, stress-management classes, campus counsel-lors and greater interaction between stu-dents and faculty members, are some best practices being adopted not only in India, but universities across the world.

Ohio State University, for example, runs a programme called Reach, through which faculty members encourage stu-dents to identify specific problem areas and discuss it with them. In some cases, students are also motivated to seek med-ical help. The objective is to create a sus-tainable environment for students, in which they won’t breakdown under pres-sure and resort to extreme measures like suicide.

Another such laudable effort was made by Cornell University. For several years Cornell topped the lists of ‘univer-sities with most suicides’. Being located near a series of rocky ravines, it provided an easy route for students to kill them-selves. But then in 2002, the university decided to do away with this tag and went all guns blazing against the prob-lem. It put in place various measures modelled on the US Air Force suicide-

prevention programme. The faculty, staff and hall advisors were taught how to notice the warning signs. Students were introduced to psychiatric-wellness pro-grammes. Guards were appointed to monitor campus activities. The suicide rate, since then, has fallen drastically.

the heart of the MatterWhile it is heartening to find educational institutions attempting to tackle height-ened levels of stress and emotional duress — the primary causes of suicide among students — the key question begs an answer: Why is there this upsurge in stress-related disorders, espe-cially among students?

Johnson Thomas, Founder Director, Aasra, an NGO that runs a suicide

helpline, apart from providing counsel-ling says, “It is the pressure that stu-dents are facing from all quarters. This kind of pressure to perform was non-existent even a decade ago.”

Today’s Gen Y is living in a veritable ‘pressure cooker’, where even the slight-est setback — be it poor grades or as in Murmu’s case, a broken relationship — leads to life-changing dynamics. And they silence their detractors with the ulti-mate weapon: a suicide note.

towards a Wiser horizon?

“Students these days only want to achieve — at whatever cost. They go through the whole rigmarole of educa-tion without understanding what it is about,” says a parent who doesn’t want to be named. “Education is not about getting a job. It is about learning to face the world and its crises more wisely,” she adds.

Now perhaps, more than ever before, is the time to think about re-integrating our traditional models of education with the modern-day one. An education sys-tem that teaches one to handle failures and losses, instead of only excelling in exams, is bound to see a natural decline in student suicides.

dr a kumar has been appointed as the new Director of Institute of Management Studies (IMS) Ghaziabad. He is a well known veteran with 34 years of rich industry experience. He obtained a Masters in Business Administration and PhD from MIT Sloan after completing Engineering from BHU (Now IIT).He has a strong alliance with Ivy League colleges and industry. He has worked with MIT Sloan School of Management (USA), Harvard Business School and XLRI Jamshedpur.

His significant achievements are, planning for building intellectual capital, value creation for workforce, international linkage, gap analysis, establishing the institutional excellence and building organisation. He has also conducted a comprehensive research on “Creation for Silicon Valley model in USA to improve US Economy in early 80s”.

appointment | ImS Ghaziabad

a kumar to be iMS Ghaziabad director


FACE-TO-FACE Pratap Bhanu Mehta

His face is calm. No worry lines furrow his brow. His deep set eyes could throw you off balance till a laugh sets you at ease. He had left India straight after school and was working overseas till 2001. You look for traces of an accent and wonder why there is none. You have read so many of his columns and he is almost familiar. But you are surprised on meeting him – at finding him so approachable. Just 44 and yet all the recognition including the latest Infosys Prize for Social Sciences for 2011, has only humbled him. EDU brings you face-to-face with columnist, thinker, researcher and professor who has influenced many a mind on public policy and politics in India without the usual brouhaha

Academia’s primary job is to

create an intellectual order out of a world

that is inherently mysterious to us B

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Pratap Bhanu Mehta & smita PoliteFACE FACETO

About Smita Polite Managing Editor at EDU she was part of the team that launched it. Brought up in college campuses, she graduated from LSR Delhi and went to do Social Communications and Media at Sophia Mumbai. She has also worked with Times of India, Mumbai, Delhi and Gulf Times, Doha .

The Soul Scientist


Pratap Bhanu Mehta FACE-TO-FACE



PRATAP BHANU MEHTA: I was in Class VII when my father, a polit ical scientist, moved to Rajasthan University. Jaipur was a small town without being parochial. At 10 or 11 years, you were given a bicycle and let free, as long as you came back at the agreed hour. We stayed on the campus — beautifully designed and extraordinarily green. The university guest house overlooking the Gandhi statue was my favourite hang-out. All the seminars and cultural festivals were organised here. I used to cycle to this spot with friends and spent hours soaking in the intellec-tual air. On most days, we would be accosted by Prof Daya Krishna, an emi-nent thinker and philosopher, who loved talking to young kids on why we thought ‘this’ or did not think ‘that’. Prof S Lokan-athan, a physicist was a regular visitor at home. Political and academic discus-sions would accompany the evening tea at our home.

won three successive elections in Jodh-pur. But, what stood out in his campaigns was the absolute refusal to accept dona-tions. He quit politics in the 1960s when he realised that the game had changed. He raised a large family with very little money but high ideals. I grew up with four uncles never knowing the distinction between my own family and the extended one.

SMITA: Pratap has lived on university campuses for most of his life. He was born when his father Vrajendra Raj Mehta, who would later become the VC of Delhi, was doing his PhD at Cambridge. His first three years were spent on that campus. The family next moved to Shimla in Himachal and then to Rajasthan. Pratap’s grandfather Jaswant Raj Mehta’s principled interest in public life and protective guidance to his extended family influenced him strongly.

My grandfather was a lawyer in Jodhpur. He joined public service in the pre-Inde-pendence Jodhpur state. He was legend-ary for the work he did during the famine of 1942. I had heard stories of his honesty, his refusing favours of the king and his passion to serve the people. He entered politics contesting as an independent can-didate in 1951. Later, Jawahar Lal Nehru persuaded him to join the Congress. He

About Pratap Bhanu Mehta

Born: 26th July 1967

PreSent occuPation: President, Centre for Policy Research, Delhi

Family: Wife Smita runs an NGO Gunjan Foundation. Daughter is in Class IX and son Vaibhav in class V

BooKWorm: Books on World War II were an early favourite. The summer between Class XI and XII was spent in going over War & Peace again and again

HiS Secret: Can eat any amounts of rice. The other two glories of Indian civilisation he adores are Paan and Rosogolla

FaVourite Quote: “Those who hate vice too much love mankind too little”— Edmund Burke



Pratap studied at St Xavier’s, Jaipur and admits to a schizophrenic view of his school life. The teachers and education were not exciting, but he learnt an incredible amount from friends.

I passed Class XII from the CBSE board, but I cannot tell you my marks (laughs). Thankfully, I had already got admission in Oxford. I was in Class IX, when my father went as a visitor to Oxford. It was rare for Oxford to accept students right after high school, but based on my entrance exam of open-ended essays, I was offered admis-sion to philosophy, politics and econom-ics streams. Finances were a huge issue.

But Oxford offered a scholarship and I also got some support from family. I liked economics and suspect my parents would have been happier to have me pur-sue it. But I abandoned it in favour of political philosophy.

Choosing social sciences was making a virtue out of necessity. The pressure of entrance exams that his friends were appearing for did not appeal to him. If he had not been at Oxford, he would have probably done law.

The mid eighties — 1985 to 1989 — was probably the last lap of Oxford’s great-ness. The atmosphere in the university was seeped in scholarly pursuits. Political philosophy had a seminar series called Star Wars that featured speakers like Amartya Sen, Ronald Dworkin, Charles Taylor and Jerry Cohen. It was like a dream world — very inspiring and excit-ing. It was perhaps at this time that I got completely hooked to academia. Academ-ics do work incredibly hard, but at their own pace. There’s an element of discov-

ery, fun of reading books. If you can make a living this way then why do anything else? I was clear that this is what I wanted. We had extraordinary teachers who threw you into the deep end. Fresh from CBSE system, here I was handed a reading list with the works of authors like David Hume. I had this 500-page book, with no page numbers and had to write an essay on it. This is the fundamental difference between undergrads in India and at a place like Oxford. Here students are taught to fear ideas in big books. In con-trast the tutors at Oxford challenged your presuppositions as well as their own.

I particularly remember one tutor knocking down an essay to say that the first rule in life when you set out to evalu-ate anything was “Don’t think you have the answer to a question even before the question is asked.” If you think here’s a key that unlocks everything, you look through that prism in life.

It also helped that as a 17-year-old I got to hang out with graduates from various disciplines. Mahesh Rangarajan, current-ly a professor at DU, was a close friend. My contemporaries at Oxford included Nandini Sundar, Arvind Subramanian, Dilip Menon and Amit Chaudhuri. Chaudhuri, who is now a well-known author, is still a close friend. With six dif-ferent reading clubs and endless streams of conversation, I got to learn as much from my friends as my tutors.

Unlike most of his other friends, Pratap never went backpacking around Europe. He tells you that he has a sort of lazy traveller disposition — like Newton’s law — a body at rest must remain at rest. Finances were also a consideration, as a single phone call at that time could wipe off ones budget. But more than

anything, the summer break of two months was time to reconnect with family and come back to India. He chose summer not because it’s the best time to visit, but the longest break in the university system.

I had initially thought of doing a PhD in intellectual history at Cambridge. At the end of second year at Oxford, I applied, got through and was assigned a supervi-sor — John Dunn. In our first and last two hour interaction he kept forcing me to think “Why Cambridge? It’s much the same as Oxford.” He impressed upon me that the centre of academic world had shifted to America. There was this huge exodus of teachers in 1988 from Oxford to America. I decided to apply to the US uni-versities and opted for Princeton. At the time, one of my undergrad teachers, Alan Ryan, had also moved to Princeton, though I wasn’t aware of it. I suspect he may have had something to do with Princeton accepting me, but I never got to know.

Incidentally though, do you know what Bertrand Russell had said about Prince-ton? (I shake my head in negative.) He had said that it is as close as monkeys will get to imitating Oxford (laughs). But America was certainly different in terms of methodologies. The study of political theory at Princeton was wonderful. There was a lot of pressure to work on India, but I steered away from it. I did not want to do it in the American context, where the pri-mary purpose is to explain India to the western world. I personally loved political philosophy and finally wrote my disserta-tion on Adam Smith.

In the fourth year of his PhD, Pratap was offered a joint appointment in the government at Harvard. It was the only job he had applied for. The interdisciplinary programme in social studies is their best undergrad social science major. Interestingly, Alan Ryan was also on his dissertation committee along with Amy Gutmann and George Kateb. They all felt that Pratap was the right man for this job.

“music is the one thing that’s a constant at home besides arguments. i have zero musical

talent but great love for music. i probably owe my entire undergraduate education to

Bhimsen Joshi and Kumara Gandharva”— Pratap Bhanu Mehta



Junior faculty at Harvard can sometimes feel debilitated with the pressures. Tenure was still a big deal at that time. To me it was a good opportunity to learn; so I just enjoyed it. Social studies gave a younger set of fabulous colleagues and extraordi-nary students. Teaching them pushed you to raise your intellectual bar. I just enjoyed political philosophy and intellectual his-tory, getting refereed articles published and making my own courses. I was sur-prised at myself, at Harvard, at how much I loved teaching.

In 1992 Pratap got married to Smita, just before joining Harvard. Smita, was from Calcutta and worked in the tea industry there. When she moved to the US, she joined International Forest Products.

My first review at Harvard was very encouraging, but it made Smita and I reflect on our future. Academically, it was the place to be. But there was no point in living the perpetual NRI life. Our daugh-ter Vidisha was a year old and we knew taking a child who had grown up in the US to India would pose problems. More-over, all our friends were returning home. We had to set a date for our return, but to what and where?

Smita had the right attitude: “First, don’t go back thinking it’s going to be great. Second, make prudent choices. Don’t fall off a cliff by joining a place which you know could be falling.” In the summer of 1999, on my visit here, I let it be known that if there was an offer worth considering, I would be open to coming back. The then JNU VC, Ashish Dutta, was the first one to pick it up. JNU was planning to set up two new centres — Centre for Philosophy and Centre for Law and Governance. On his visit to Har-vard in 2000, Dutta asked me if I would be interested in setting up Centre for Philosophy.

I had no illusions about life in JNU and its ideological image. But it had a big advantage — faculty members chose their own courses. On the other hand, most other universities in India have to teach courses dictated by UGC. I wanted free-dom as a teacher, and I knew this was

Mukherjee of The Telegraph. In 2002, Godhara riots shook India. Big debates on education had also taken off. I started writing and found that it generated inter-esting conversations. After spending 16 years abroad, reconnecting with issues at home was part of the encouragement for public writing, and soon, it acquired a life of its own.

In July 2004, the Centre for Policy Research offer came up. Pratap thought they had got the wrong person. But it was partly his public writing and partly the belief of CPR board members like Sanjaya Barua and Meenakshi Gopinath in him that had prompted the offer. CPR meant leading a triple life, he tells you. One part was engaging with institutional issues, another public writing which he enjoys, and the third, an academic role. Does he find time for research?

Research has not taken a backseat, and I am tough about carving out time for it. One advantage of living in Gurgaon is that you don’t hang around in Delhi after 5 pm, at IIC, despite its air of self-impor-tant charms. The board at CPR shares the vision of academic freedom and I still have the luxury of taking six-eight weeks off to teach at an institution where I would be professionally challenged. So last year, I was teaching at Brown, the year before I was at NYU and this year at UPenn. But I must admit that I regret not teaching as much as I would like. Also, when you do more things than you are capable of, you enjoy them a lot less.

Pratap has been part of several committees on higher education and policy. The Lyngdoh Committee and the National Knowledge ommission, which he walked out of, are the most notable ones. Does being a part of coterie of leaders who can influence important decisions weigh on him?

The Knowledge Commission itself was a lot of fun. Sam, Andre, Nandan and Deep-ak set up a great atmosphere. In 2006, when it was set up, there was euphoria about it. Then the OBC extension hap-

the only universi ty in India to give it. I had the option of staying on at Harvard. But Smita and I decided to take the plunge.

Pratap had purchased a little plot in Gurgaon while still in US. His parents and younger brother were also in Gurgaon. So this is where he moved upon his return.

JNU was administratively very difficult. The quality of PhD in MPhil programme was not up to the mark. A couple of cen-tres apart, the calibre of students was dis-mal. Teaching was a challenge because of the vast categories of students. Yet I enjoyed teaching. But at that time there was a bizarre campaign against people with foreign degrees. JNUTA would dis-cuss the Palestine issue but not the future of JNU. No attempt was being made to improve the pedagogy. Things went from bad to worse and I resigned. But it was not accepted for a long time. In the mean-time, Harvard arranged for me to return in 2004 and I went back.

I had enjoyed being in India. I had met N Ravi of The Hindu at Harvard earlier, and he had asked me to write for it. I was also invited to write by Rudrangshu

“academics do work incredibly hard, but at their own pace. there’s an element of discovery, fun of reading books. if you can make a living this way then why do anything else?”



pened. Though I believe in affirmative action and I knew that higher education is going nowhere, I wanted to resign. A lot more people would have probably resigned, but there were two worries: one you would be labelled as an upper caste person resigning in protest and the other that you don’t believe in affirmative action. So, I decided to make the resigna-tion public to avoid misunderstandings. Such decisions are always a dilemma. If you engage with policy matters you feel you will be able to change things from inside; but when you choose to change the consciousness from outside you do not need to worry whether the ministry will like it or not. The Lyngdoh Committee helped me to look at a different side of Indian universi-ties — the relationship between students and politics. We had meetings in Luc-know, Patna and Calcutta. Lyngodoh’s working style was very matter of fact. Thankfully, we mostly agreed and finally the committee came up with recommen-dations which helped make a difference in student elections.

It’s been almost a decade since Pratap took the most difficult and challenging decision of his life by moving from Harvard to JNU. Has he finally adjusted to the culture and administrative style here? What does he miss most about Oxford and Princeton?

I miss intellectual ambition. The attrac-tion and romance of knowledge has to be such that it’s non instrumental. This is society’s risk investment and you have no idea what will come off it. Academia’s pri-mary job is to create an intellectual order out of a world that is inherently mysteri-ous to us. Everything else is subordinate to that — how much money you earn or what social impact it will have. In undergrad education particularly, there should be no inhibition about pursuing things and exploring what kinds of methods are appropriate for answering which question.

Does he also feel that social sciences have been neglected in India? What

is his opinion in particular on research in social sciences? Has an award like the Infosys Prize helped?

I won’t say that social sciences have been neglected. We have more PhD pro-grammes in social sciences than the US. But, political science has always been a little behind in terms of critical mass and standards in evolving protocols of profes-sionalism. Social science cannot be free from ideology. But its ideologisation in India was way overdone, particularly in the university departments. A lot of peo-ple in centres like CSDS and CPR are refugees from the university system. There was a lot of excitement in social sci-ences in the institutions I studied in because they communicated their passion for research in the classroom. Most Indi-

and events. How does he juggle his roles of teacher, researcher, policymaker, columnist, father and husband?

At the end of the day it’s not time. If you have been in a bureaucratic meeting for an hour in the morning, it takes another hour to recover after the meeting and think differently, that weighs you down. In spite of a political paralysis, there is a sense that lots of things have to change.The intellectual infrastructure to service that is still very small. For me reading for research is really valuable. In the after-noon while the world thinks I have an appointment, I am probably reading a book. And I have protected my night read-ing. Machiavelli had said: At night retire with the ancients. Writing is of course

“teaching has been the most fulfilling and valuable activity in my career” — Pratap Bhanu Mehta

an professors cannot do that. Not because there is no connection between teaching and research. But, because you are not in control of your class as you are not assign-ing the books and are teaching someone else’s syllabus. You can get through Indi-an school system without ever writing a genuine essay. So the skill of developing an argument is missing. The culture of reading and writing is missing. Research in social sciences varies by discipline. In political science you can’t name a single well reputed journal. It requires a critical mass to make an impact. Awards like the Infosys Prize are forms of social recogni-tion. Not that the researchers are doing it for recognition. What’s the function of Nobel Prize? Anyone who decides to work to get a Nobel is surely not going to get it. The prize according to me is meant to make a statement that there should be good research in India.

Winning this prize must have made his schedule more packed with requests to be on various fora, panels

more complicated. It’s said that you should have a target of writing just 750 words a day for you to keep your creativity alive. My PhD advisor said that in social sciences you never finish a work. You just stop writing. Most of my work gets over early in the morning between 5:30 to 7:00 am. Of course, age is catching up and I get up later than I used to. I try to meet as few people as I possibly can. I still find time for family. In order to be grounded you need that. And that’s exactly what I do. Evening, just before dinner I have kept for family.

It’s 6 pm. You are keeping him from his schedule, you realise and take your leave. He’s told you that he’s going to Jaipur the next day. You wonder if he will be going to the Gandhi statue where he first tasted the joy of scholarly pursuits. You make a silent wish that his love for academic life passes on to many other brilliant minds and helps higher education overcome inertia.


Bridging Gaps IT-enablement can help good colleges build bridges to distance education and fill the gaps to learning by shankar venkaTagIrI, assIsTanT Professor, QMIs, IIM bangalore(first of a three-part series)

Over the past decade, the World Wide Web has spread its tentacles to the farthest reaches of our country. Whereas

internet users across the world have grown six-fold over this period, emerg-ing nations like India and China have witnessed a twenty-fold increase. These numbers mask the reality that only one in every 12 Indians can currently access the web, whereas four times as many Chinese can (See a tabulation by Inter-net World Stats at http://www.internet-worldstats.com/top20.html ).

After Independence, the Indian Govern-ment and some private trusts concertedly built up capacity for higher learning.

50 Tech case sTudy: Green IT

42-45 Tech snIppeTs: Technology news and Tips and Tricks

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enabling institutions with IT TECHNOLOGy


Today, 15 million Indians are enrolled in brick-and-mortar as well as distance learning universities. To quench an ever-increasing demand for trained manpower, our gross enrolment rate (GER) in higher learning has to double by 2020. Our country is blessed with talented teachers at all levels, and quality academic institu-tions that have been around for decades. If these institutions were technology-enabled, they could help raise the GER by expanding their enrolments manifold.

However, only a select set of academic institutions in India have harnessed the awesome power of technology, albeit in an organic fashion. Most have opted to stay clear of all things IT. An oft-cited reason is the absence of management support to implement changes. Consequently, a sys-tem of discrimination has sprung up with-in our institutions: those that are IT-enabled, and those that are not. Even though the students of the latter category are fully at home with technology, any knowledge and skills they acquire on their own shall remain vastly undirected.

There is a flawed per-ception that IT-enable-ment is a complicated and expensive proposition. Truth is, any conventional ‘degree college’ with a generous, open-minded management and a com-mitted faculty body can be t ransformed into a dynamic learning envi-

ronment. The first article in this three part series highlights a graded set of steps to establish good IT infrastructure on the campus. The key aspects of software acquisition and skills training for the faculty must also be considered. With an eye on increasing scale while contain-ing costs, the benefits of the cloud model are explained.

The next part elaborates on institution-wide platforms such as learning manage-ment systems and lecture capture systems, which facilitate richer interactions between the faculty and the learners. The conclud-ing article in the series examines the vital role videos can play in assisting learning. It details the author’s own experience with-developing videos for an MBA-level statis-tics course, and showcases student reac-tions to the exercise. In addition, it offers some pointers for an IT-enabled college to make the grand leap into distance learning.

Technology Enablement Even though the chalk-and-talk lecture

method is the dominant form of pedagogy in India, some instructors have begun to use slides, play videos off the inter-net, and run applets and animations. Students can assimilate higher order skills and knowl-edge better when instruc-tion is accompanied by dynamic demos, which they can try out on their

own. All of this is feasible only when the institution is IT-enabled.

One reason many of our colleges are yet to make the switch to IT is the worry that installing and maintaining IT infrastruc-ture ‘on premises’ is too complicated. A small IT division consisting of a set of pro-fessionals can capably manage this effort. Managements must come to terms with the reality that the budget for their salaries may well exceed that of the infrastructure: after all, the benefits far outweigh the costs. Also, software and hardware upgrades may cause recurrent headaches. But by closing the avenues to IT-enable-ment, an institution misses the boat to modernity. We shall see how the set up costs can be contained by taking the cloud computing route.

Campus Infrastructure For a traditional college, IT-enablementbegins by equipping every classroom with a projector, a computer console, good lighting, a cordless mic and a sound system. It is reasonable nowadays to ask every student to own a laptop. A loan or a subsidy from the college authorities for needy students would be welcome, in lieu of building a large ‘lab’ and installing hundreds of desktop machines, which will obsolesce quickly. The funds may also be utilised to enable each faculty member to procure a decent laptop.

Installing a campus-wide networkenables the community of faculty, stu-dents and staff to access ‘critical services’

Only 1 in every 12

Indians can access the web, whereas

four times as many Chinese can

The Government of India has said that it will bring out the improved version of the Aakash tablet by April this year. Aakash 2 is likely to have several improved specifications such as elongated battery life and faster processor. Touted as the world’s cheapest tablet, it has faced harsh criticism from several quarters for its poor quality and dismal features.IIT Rajasthan, which developed the prototype of the device along with DataWind, found a series of faults in the device, prompting reports in the media that the

government is reconsidering the project. Under pressure to provide better endowed low-cost device, the government has now its turned attention to the Aakash 2, which is likely to come at the same price tag of the original Aakash.HRD Minister Kapil Sibal has said that the government will be looking for more manufacturers to manufacture the Aakash 2 tablets, attributing the massive demand for the move. “We want to make sure that the upgraded product caters to the need of the customers...We will be able to bring in Aakash 2 by April,” Kapil Sibal said.

TECH SNippET | Tablet

Aakash 2 tablet to be launched by April 2012


TECHNOLOGy enabling institutions with IT

A new Facebook app called ‘If I Die’ has sparked interest from all corners of the web. The app’s primary function is to allow users to write what they want as their final words on their Facebookwall, with the app engineered to post the message after they die. The app asks — what will you leave behind? The’ If I Die’ app was developed by an Israeli company that specialises in ‘time capsules’. The company’s co-founders were inspired to create the app, after a few close friends nearly lost their lives in a traffic accident in Italy. The team behind the app

suggests users upload something they might have never shared before, or thought to while they were alive.According to the company, the app,

which already has 5,000 likes on Facebook, will publish the

posthumous message only after three friends or ‘trustees’ that have assigned the

responsibility, verify the If I Die user’s death.Interestingly, If I Die users will also have the choice to upload a video they want aired posthumously. Facebook already has what it calls a memorial service, where once it has confirmed one of its users has passed away, it converts their Facebook wall into a memorial accessible only by friends.

TECH SNippET | Apps

‘If I Die’ app for posthumous message

such as email, file storage and the inter-net. Falling prices of computer servers, network cables, and routers and internetbandwidth have brought infrastructure costs down to a level where a nominal mark-up in fees can change the Indian college into one where the teachers and students can incorporate IT into all aspects of learning.

The college must negotiate with ven-dors to provision adequate internet bandwidth to everyone via the campus network. Over the long run, the govern-ment would do well to make this band-width free to academic institutions.

Personal Computing Once every student and instructor owns a personal laptop, the next step is to exploit the processing power at hand. Software applications need not be a drain on finances. Packages like LibreOf-fice include applications enable instruc-tors and students to create word docu-ments , spreadshee ts and s l ide presentations, and are downloadable for free (Browse to http://libreoffice.org). So are packages such as Mozilla Firefox for web browsing, and VLC Player to play a wide variety of multimedia content. Many outfits in India, including media houses, are using these solutions with-out problems.

Competing vendors tend to downplay the appeal of such free software options, either by claiming that they are ‘unsta-ble’ or ‘insecure’, or are not fit for ‘high-level’ use. The author runs MBA-level

courses using LibreOffice presentations and spreadsheets. Reputed academics around the world exploit tools such as Octave and R to carry out sophisticated mathematical and statistical computa-tions. The website Sourceforge.com lists thousands of free applications, which are categorised by discipline.

It is unfair to expect instructors who possess only the basic know-how to use a computer, to bring about radical change. The money saved on software licences must be used to boost their capabilities for teaching within an IT-enabled set-ting. Also, troubleshooting problems on one’s own is a key survival skill for the technology-enabled generation. This can be accomplished by coaching users on how to conduct an internet search, and to interpret and execute the suggestions.

On a higher level training in instruc-tional systems design helps teachers cre-ate presentations that are fit for indepen-dent viewing. If they are shown how to adopt a constructivist approach to design their course materials, it will immensely help the college make the transition to distance learning, when the time is ripe.

Cloud Computing Institutions large and small that have

been managing their IT services ‘on prem-ises’ have come to realise the complexities of the task, besides footing the cost of ongoing maintenance and upgrades. Wouldn’t it be terrific if for a relatively small fee, a college’s critical services could be ‘outsourced to the internet’, and

accessed by the community over a web browser? This is the promise of cloud computing.

Outfits like Google offer colleges an entire suite of online applications (http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/edu/universi-ty.html) to support email, calendaring, document creation and storage, video sharing, and so on. These applications are tailored for browsing on popular devices such as phones and tablets, which can be a hit with today’s mobile generation. If the college’s IT personnel are willing, they can be trained to migrate existing critical ser-vices to the cloud. Otherwise, consultants are abundantly readily available to execute this one-time task.

Why is it advantageous for a college to ‘get on the cloud’? Technically, the same software that supports a well-off Western university shall be operating the critical services for this college. All that is required is a virtual front-end that reflects the col-lege’s theme and personality. Students of the graphic arts and computer science streams can work together, and create a portal for their ‘virtual campus’. The plas-ter on the physical walls may be peeling, but the online presence will be as sprightly as ever. Operationally, an on-premises model might warrant upgrading software licences whenever an additional set of learners has to be accommodated. In the cloud model, handling such ongoing requirements is easy: an IT administrator simply creates their accounts (online), and authorises them to access the services with the help of a single sign-on.


enabling institutions with IT TECHNOLOGy

If the Department of Telecom (DoT) has its way, the country will soon have a nationwide network that will facilitate secured communication for government use. The project estimated to cost Rs 4.5 bn aims to provide secured network-based services for the government such as email, voice-over-internet protocol (VoIP) and mobile communication. Around Rs 3 bn has been allocated for setting up fixed and wireless network infrastructure, while Rs 1 bn has been set aside for operational expenditure for five years. The remaining Rs 500 mn will go towards

research and development.According to Times of India, DoT’s working group points out that the country presently depends on email and VoIP services that are provided by foreign companies. Though these services may be secure from hackers, the communication can still be accessed by the government of other countries where servers are hosted.The DoT has suggested that such network will ensure data traffic does not flow outside the country.

“ By closing the avenues to

IT-enablement, you miss the boat to

modernity”—Shankar Venkatagiri

asssistant Professor, IIM-b

TECH SNippET | network

DoT to set up pan-India secure network

All transactions, thereafter, are executed, with a web browser — no elaborate appli-cations need be installed.

Storing documents on the cloud opens up a new world of possibilities. A project group can collaborate on a report by edit-ing a single shared document that is acces-sible on the internet. Faculty across the world employ this mechanism to co-author papers, without having to mail their edits back and forth.

The author has harnessed shared spreadsheets to dynamically illustrate sta-tistical results to his students, after asking each of them to submit one row of data.

Any data (mails, documents, etc.,) that is stored on a cloud service is backed up fre-quently, so the threat of losing it is rare. The downtime for critical services on the cloud is minimal, because it is the lookout of a vendor, who has committed to serve customers large and small, on the same platform. Whereas it is customary to observe a ‘maintenance shutdown’ once a week in the on-premises model, a cloud vendor’s ‘uptime’ commitment is around 99 per cent. We can, therefore, expect the cloud model to be a game changer, pitch-ing the local IT division against global out-fits that offer economies of scale.

Vendors with vested interests have a habit of seeding FUDs (fears, uncertainties and doubts) in the minds of academic decision-makers. One popular FUD is that pushing the college onto the cloud will ‘expose’ its data to everyone, and is there-fore an insecure solution.

True, there have been a handful of

compromises in the history of popular cloud services. However, for every such instance, there have been myriads of virus-es, worms and hacking attacks that have wrought havoc upon on-premises IT installations, leading to extensive outages, data leaks and data losses without a scope for recovery. The maturity of the cloud model is borne out by the testimony of a Forbes contributor (Joe McKendrick in Forbes; 10 ways Cloud Computing will Disrupt our Businesses; 14th December

2011): “A few months back, I spoke with a CIO who admitted that he felt his data is probably in better hands with a well-trained, SAS-70 compliant cloud provider than trying to keep his own systems and staff up to date with security procedures and protocols.”

The distinctions between software appli-cations on premises and on the cloud are fast blurring. Scientific packages such as Wolfram|Alpha and Matlab (See http://products.wolframalpha.com/android/ and http://www.mathworks.in/mobile/connect-tocloud.Html) are now available on the cloud.

What becomes of the college’s IT per-sonnel in this disruptive cloud model? It is but natural to worry that their responsibili-ties may be reduced to maintaining status quo: attending to any computer and net-work problems that arise, ensuring con-stant internet linkage, and so on. On the contrary, IT personnel must be encour-aged to play a more strategic role, with a mission to modernise the college’s IT set-up, and adequately prepare it for the chal-lenges of scale.

There is also a wide variety of ‘web ser-vices’ that help large universities execute key steps such as processing applications, conducting entrance tests, and maintain-ing alumni relations. IT personnel may be charged with evaluating such options and making recommendations.

(Watch out for the next two parts of this arti-cle in EDU’s forthcoming issues)


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In his book Only the Paranoid Sur-vive, Andrew Grove reflects on a strategic inflection point when the environment changes in a fundamental way. In higher edu-

cation, we have reached that point of inflection. The disruptive forces of a rap-idly growing young population, com-bined with their unique needs make for a complex scenario where the world is ill-equipped to handle their educational needs. In this scenario, the cost and rel-evance of educational systems are being debated around the world.

This conference is part of the EDGE Forum (Emerging Directions in Global Education), a group of leading educa-tional institutions from public and pri-vate sector, committed to promoting high standards of education. The man-date of the conference is to provoke thought and action, while establishing a platform for international collaboration.

The two major themes of the confer-ence are: Learning X.O and Simulations & Serious Games. The X.O in Learning X.O is like a version number. While Learning 1.0 is based upon the current traditional systems, Learning 2.0 takes into the impact of the network or com-munity of teachers and learners on the process of teaching and learning. Learn-ing 3.0, as the next evolution, suggests that learning could be ubiquitous and personalised to the need of the individu-al. The Learning X.O theme tries to syn-thesise the impressive and disruptive research and experimentation around this evolution in learning. In particular, it focusses on broadly three loosely con-nected ideas.

The first of these is the theory of Con-nectivism, proposed by George Siemens

and Stephen Downes in 2005, which states that learning is the “process of making connections” and “knowledge is the network”. They propose that tradi-tional theories of learning such as con-structivism are not sufficient to explain how learning can happen in a digital age.In order to experiment and develop this new theory, George, Stephen and Dave Cormier, opened the debate through an online course that ran for three months in 2008 called Connectivism and Con-nective Knowledge (CCK08). CCK08 went on to become the first of a series of disruptive experiments in online learn-ing which were titled Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). They were massive because of the number of par-ticipants they attracted. CCK08 had over 2,200 participants.

The second framework is called Infor-mal Learning propounded by Jay Cross, the person who coined the term ‘eLearn-ing’. Jay, along with many others, believes that a large proportion of learn-ing and teaching happens outside the formal classroom. Industry analysts like Josh Bersin quantify informal learning as being over 70 per cent of all learning that happens in the individual’s lifetime. The challenge before us is to harness this type of learning.

The third framework is called the Communities of Practice (CoPs) frame-work. Propounded by Etienne Wenger, CoPs are “groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.” CoPs may be inten-tionally founded and managed, but it is not necessary that they be so.

What makes Connectivism and the associated themes so disruptive is just

that — its potential to arm an entirely new generation of theorists, researchers and practitioners with the thought para-digm and tools to comprehend the impacts of disruptive technology, over-abundant knowledge, demographic pressures and changing social relations, among other important trends.

Underlying all these, is the tremen-dous principle of democratisation of education — of education to be by, for and of the people. Dave Cormier is working on Rhizomatic Learning, which “suggests that embrac-ing uncertainty as the critical component in the teaching/learning process is the best way to foster creative, adaptive and independent learners.”

Alec Couros has given hundreds of workshops and presentations, nationally and internationally, on topics such as openness in education, social/networked learning, learning environments, digital citizenship, and critical media literacy.

Grainne Conole is researching ways in which new pedagogies and approaches to design can harness the potential of social and participatory media.

Martin Weller is investigating the implications of scholarship in a digital world, having recently published one of the first texts on the subject.

Jon Dron is looking at learning envi-ronment design and investigating the “shapes of online socially enhanced dwellings that are most likely to lead to enhanced knowledge and, in the pro-cess, uncover some of the nature of tech-nologies and our intimately connected cyborg relationships with them”.

All these speakers continue to raise the bar with advanced thinking and research into areas such as learning analytics.

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Meanwhile, the other theme, Simula-tions and Serious Games, explores how rich digital media and delivery platforms can combine to produce digital learning experiences.

The work of Clark Quinn and Alicia Sanchez, and other speakers such as Sid-dharth Banerjee from Indusgeeks, who has built an amazing platform for virtual 3D worlds called Metamersive, and Jatin-der Singh from Atelier who is building next generation simulation based train-ing frameworks, will lay the foundation for rethinking digital media.

Clark Quinn provides a wide perspec-tive — he is rethinking our conception of learning and systems for learning and is investigating models such as spaced practice, social learning, metalearning, and distributed cognition.

Les Foltos focusses on teacher educa-tion and how educator communities can use peer coaching as a technique to con-tinuously learn and evolve.

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Amruth BR, Anirudh Phadke and a host of other exciting speakers from India, bring in yet more perspectives on design, content, new age assessments, semantic web, mobility, scalability in school education and educational tech-nology, thus rounding off this theme. Amruth BR from MeritTrac will talk about a possible roadmap for Indian education in which quality education becomes part of every child’s life. Man-ish Upadhyay will bring in perspectives on how tablet based learning can happen inside the classroom. Satish Sukumar, who leads the award winning EduNxt team from Manipal Global Education, will talk about the way cutting edge tech-nology can be harnessed for teaching and learning.

Rajeev Menon from MeritTrac will talk about next generation assessment tech-niques and platforms. Shanath Kumar from Sikkim Manipl University will talk about content curation as a role of faculty and model of pedagogy. Girish Gopalkrishnan from Skills Victoria, Aus-

tralia will talk about his vision for adaptive learning platforms, connected learning environments, haptics, holographic learn-ing and recognition of informal learning through badges. Anirudh Phadke from Beyond Teaching will talk about his expe-riences and challenges with an informal network of 13000+ educators.

This conference will act as the melting pot for disruptive research and practice and marks the start of new level of col-laboration between participants post the conference. The online conference group (Google Group: EDGEX2012) is an open online space where participants and speakers are co-creating the conference. Particularly for India, the timing of these disruptions could not be more apt.

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Article by Viplav Baxi, Lead Organiser for the EDGEX Conference. Viplav is an eLearning Researcher, Entrepreneur and Innovator. He blogs @, learnos.wordpress.com. Twitter:@ViplavBaxi


TECHNOLOGy case study

Green IT — A Practical Case of ImplementationWith a focus on creating an energy-efficient, environmentally sustainable process in education, KLN College of engineering transformed its lab into a state-of-the-art one

Green IT is the study and practice of designing, manufacturing, and using computers, serv-ers, monitors, printers,

storage devices, networking and com-munications systems efficiently and effectively with minimal impact on the environment. It includes environmental sustainability, the economics of energy-efficiency, and the total cost of owner-ship, which incorporates the cost of dis-posal and recycling. Green IT is also about the application of IT to create busi-ness processes and practices that will consume less energy thereby being less damaging to the environment.

I, as an application engineer was more interested “to create energy-efficient,environmentally sustainable business

Tech case sTudyIT, KLN College of Engineering, Pottapalayam, Tamil Nadu

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TECHNOLOGy case study

processes and practices” in an education-al environment. It was driven by energy crisis, load shedding, messy wiring of power and networking cables, operation and maintenance cost of UPS and their batteries.

In 2010, Intel’s Atom Processors were making inroads into netbooks. Net-books are lightweight, energy-efficient and have all features like WiFi, web cam-era, built-in mic and speakers. They can comfortably work with built-in batteries for more than five hours without exter-nal power. The 10” LCD screen is suffi-cient for most of the software develop-ment experiments in an engineering college. The cost of the system is almost 50 per cent of that of regular laptops. I decided to design IT department’s new WiFi lab totally on the Green IT concept. To improve security and reduce cost,

Ubuntu 10.4 LTS OS, Open Office, Bouml (CASE Tool), MySql, Geany (IDE) were selected.

In our earlier lab, we had desktop systems, CAT-5 networking, intelligent switches, power supply from UPS and furniture placed near the wall to access power and network easily.

In the new lab, since I decided to use wireless router and netbook with more than five hours backup, the neces-sity to place the workbench near the wall was eliminated.

We no longer need power cables and networking cables to access power and network near the wall. It gave me the freedom to design the furniture and lay-out of the lab.

Table 1 below shows the bill of materi-als for both the labs.If you see the financial aspect, there is a

50 per cent saving on investment. This is mainly due to low cost and low energy consuming atom processor-based net-book. Further, the reduction in energy consumption makes it viable to operate with rechargeable batteries.

Once the battery backup can last for more than three hours, lab experiments can be done ‘wire free’. In fact, the net-books gave a backup of more than six hours.

The space utilisation also improved drastically. There is a 50 per cent saving in space also. Only half the area was required for the new laboratory.

Students were extremely happy on two counts. One, they were working with net-books that no college or lab is using else-where. Two, the laboratory furniture and layout is more ‘informal’ in nature. They were proud of being part of a ‘new con-cept and design’.

From an operation point of view, it simplified regular switching ‘ON’ and ‘OFF’ of the UPS, maintenance of switchboards, network outlets, cables, etc.

The layout added innovation to the con-cept of a traditional lab by ‘not clinging to the wall’. Instead of rows of tables, stu-dents sat at circular tables, which added team spirit and and made the atmosphere friendly. Students learnt using netbooks with small keyboards and displays which would help them in future.

“Students were extremely happy working with netbooks that usually no college uses and also comfortable with the informal layout”—Prof RT Sakthidarandean (academic) & head of IT, kln college of engineering, Pottapalayam, Tamil nadu

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Table:1 Comparison of a Conventional and New Laboratory

Old CASE Tools Lab

Description of Item

Desktop System, I3 Processor, 1 GB RAM 160 GB HDD, 17” TFT Monitor, 54 Nos.

Networking switches, rack cabling

6 KVA UPS 2 Nos

Electrical work

Storage cabinets

Area used Area used

Total Total

32,990

117,585

40,000

0

1,572,975

167 SQ.M

WiFi LAN

NA

Electrical work

Netbook, Intel Atom N450, 10” LCD display, 2 GB RAM, 320 GB HDD, 5 Hrs battery backup, WiFi, web camera, 54 Nos.

Price Rs Price RsDescription of Item

New WiFi LabItem No.

1 1,382,400 772,200

9,000

6,000

12,000

799,200

94 SQ.M

2

3

4

5

6


perspectiveINSIDE

F r o m o F h I g h E r E D u c a t I o N

the global 56 | Ode to Munificence?: China College Builds Statues of Donors

60 | 2012: Asia to Power Growth in Research& Development

Taps into Technion-Israel Institute of Technology’s expertise to build an applied sciences campus in New York City By matthEw KalmaN

New York Reaps Benefits of its Banker’s Largess

Jerusalem: A century after a New York banker donated $100,000 to help establish what would become the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, his

hometown is reaping the benefits of his generosity.

Last month the Technion, Israel’s old-est university, and Cornell University won a closely watched competition to build an applied-sciences campus in New York City, with a goal of spurring technology-driven economic growth in the city. As part of its winning bid, Cor-nell and the Technion plan to construct a $2-bn campus on Roosevelt Island, using land donated by the city. The facil-ity, known as NYCTech, is due to open in 2017.

The Technion is very much a junior partner in the project. Cornell will shoul-der the vast majority of the costs (as an Israeli public university, the Technion is prohibited from spending government money on projects overseas), and Tech-nion faculty members are expected to spend only short amounts of time teach-ing at the new facility.

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Jubilant: Officials congratulate each other on winning the New York City competition

gloBal.chroNIclE.com


Sign up for a free weekly electronic newsletter from The

Chronicle of Higher Education at Chronicle.Com/Globalnewsletter

The Chronicle of Higher Education is a US-based company with a weekly newspaper and a website updated daily, at Global.Chronicle.com, that cover all aspects of university life. With over 90 writers, editors, and correspondents stationed around the globe, The Chronicle provides

timely news and analysis of academ-ic ideas, developments and trends.

But tapping into Technion expertise in turn-ing the city of Haifa, where it is based, into the engine of Israel’s rapidly expanding high-tech economy is crucial to New York City’s dream of fostering the next Silicon Valley.

“Technion graduates changed the economy of Israel,” says its President, Peretz Lavie. As evidence of the institution’s impact, he says, of the 121 Israeli companies listed on Nasdaq, more than half were founded or are run by Technion graduates. “Over one generation, we moved from an economy based on Jaffa orang-es to an economy based on semiconductors.” The Technion began as the dream of pre-Israel Zionist leaders who wanted to establish a European-style technical college in what was then Palestine. With money from the wealthy New Yorker, Jacob Schiff, and a Russian tea merchant, the cornerstone was laid in 1912, but classes were delayed by World War I. The college finally opened for classes in 1924 and in nearly 90 years has developed an international reputation for engineering, computer science, mathematics, and chemistry.

For NYCTech, the Israeli university will focus primarily on developing the Technion-Cornell Institute of Innovation, the heart of the new campus that will be organised around three interdisciplinary hubs: connective media, healthier life, and the built environment. As part of the institute, Technion and Cor-nell will design a master’s of applied sciences degree to foster study across disciplines.

“The idea is to take graduates of engineering and science degrees in the United States and put them into a programme that will give them some core advanced courses in information and communications technology — these are the technologies that are relevant to all the industries that we are going to focus on,” says Paul D Feigin, a professor of statistics and Senior Executive Vice President at the Technion.

The applied-sciences programme will work closely with local industries, he says, based in part on the way the Technion has built tight relationships with corporations in Haifa. Students at the Technion, for example, often work part time during the final year of their studies.

“That way, the companies get their first peek at the talent that’s produced in the Technion, and that’s the sort of model we wanted to transfer to New York City,” Mr Feigin says.

an Entrepreneurial FocusThe approach is also attractive to students.

“The students tend to know what is going on in industry and tend to go through their edu-cation in such a way that they will be able to affect the way the industry operates here (in Haifa). That translates into entrepreneurship, into start-ups, into laboratories,” says Oded Shmueli, Technion Executive Vice President for research.

The unusual ecosystem has attracted a slew of top multinational corporations to set up branches around the Technion campus so they can entice the brightest students into their labs. The first major arrival was IBM, which

set up a research-and-development facility on the Technion campus 40 years ago. Others now eagerly snapping up Tech-nion students nearby include GE, Microsoft, Intel, Google, Phil-ips, and Yahoo. In addition, major Israeli technology leaders like Elbit, a manufacturer of advanced electronic-defence sys-tems, and Israel Aerospace Industries emerged from the Tech-nion engineering department. They have been followed in the last 20 years by dozens of high-tech start-ups and the develop-ment of new products. The institution’s tech-transfer office files an average of 300 patents a year.

The commitment to entrepreneurship is embraced at the very top. Mr Lavie, the institution’s President, is himself a serial entrepreneur. He set up sleep laboratories at Harvard Medical Centre and four Israeli hospitals, and created a medical com-pany to develop his patented equipment for the home diagnosis of sleep disorders.

Instructors also push the entrepreneurial agenda. Twenty-five years ago, Dan Shecht man, a materials-science professor, start-ed a course in technological entrepreneurship that more than 10,000 students have now attended.

“It’s designed to encourage our graduates to open start-ups sometime in the future,” says Mr Shechtman, who last year won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. “I wanted to implant the bug of entrepreneurship in their minds. I do it by bringing in invit-ed speakers, people who made it in the industry.”

a Silicon Valley for New yorkSaul Singer, co-author of Start-Up Nation, a book that chronicles the rise of Israeli’s technology sector, says the Technion experi-ence is exactly what New York needs.

“Thousands of students have graduated Shechtman’s course in entrepreneurship. That wouldn’t happen everywhere else. That’s not normal at most universities,” says Mr Singer. “The Technion, because it’s so steeped in the start-up culture of Isra-el, is a place that thinks in terms of start-ups, that understands

“Technion graduates changed the economy of Israel...to an economy based on semiconductors”

thE gloBal PErSPEctIVE


The hometown of China’s terra-cotta army boasts two new statues that are rapidly becoming famous, to the chagrin of the college that

commissioned them.They depict Athena, Greek goddess of

wisdom, and Nuwa, a Chinese mother goddess, guarding the library of Modern College, an affiliate of Northwest Univer-sity in Xi’an.

It turns out that helmeted Athena’s homely features belong to Ms Guo, a major donor who is the college board’s

Sculptures of Athena and Nuwa with features resembling two major benefactresses invite widespread scorn and ridicule By mary hENNocK

Ode to Munificence?: China College Builds Statues of Donors

chairwoman (and who, like many Chi-nese officials, was identified in news accounts only by her surname). Nuwa portrays Ms Liu, another donor and board member. The statues have attract-ed ridicule from China’s army of blog-gers and tweeters, who hoot that they are

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start-ups and entrepreneurship.”Despite what seems to some like a perfect fit, Technion offi-

cials were at first somewhat puzzled by the New York City com-petition. When New York’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg, first wrote to the Technion president in December 2010 to invite him to enter the bidding competition, the Israelis didn’t believe he was serious. “At first we thought it was kind of a joke,” says Avital Stein, Technion Executive Vice President and Director General. “Here we were, 6,000 miles away across the Atlantic, and they were asking us to build a technological institute, to create a new Silicon Valley, in New York.”

Although the Technion has taken some steps to internation-alise, including offering English-language courses in engineer-ing for foreign students and joint laboratories with Singapore University, the Israeli institution had never envisaged a project the size of the one in New York. From the start, officials at the institute believed they could not do it alone.

Technion faculty members had informal talks with Columbia University on a possible joint bid, but the collaboration didn’t work out. Then, by chance, last April, Ms Stein found herself seated near W Kent Fuchs, the Provost of Cornell, at the cente-nary celebrations of Tsinghua University in Beijing. After Mr Fuchs expressed interest in the project, she introduced him to other Technion officials, and after several months of quiet nego-tiations, the two universities struck a deal.

While the focus has been on how NYCTech will benefit New York City, Technion officials and others say it is a boon for their institution and Israel.

Bernard Avishai, a lecturer in business at the Hebrew Univer-sity of Jerusalem and a political commentator who has been sharply critical of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, says the Cornell-Technion project presents a positive message about Israeli academe. He says it weakens the argument of those who advocate for a boycott of Israel, including cutting-off relations with its universities, because of the treatment of Palestinians.

“I think this teases out in a very vivid way the absurdity of a boycott movement, which isolates and punishes the most glo-balised scientists in the world,” Mr Avishai says.

The Technion leader, of course, sees the benefits in less polit-ical terms. Mr Lavie says NYCTech will hire its own faculty, but the institute would be a natural place for Technion professors to spend their sabbaticals. The association with an American insti-tution will also give Technion faculty members access to grant money from agencies like the National Institutes of Health.

Other Technion officials say the partnership will improve Technion research, attract a new crop of students, and poten-tially increase donations to the university. (The Technion estab-lished a fund-raising office in New York City several years ago.)

“It basically transforms the Technion into a household name in New York,” says Mr Shmueli, the Vice President for Research. “When people think about where they would like to spend the rest of their career or where they want to do a postdoc fellow-ship, the Technion will be high on the list.”



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“The statues have attracted ridicule from China’s army of bloggers and tweeters, who hoot that they are proof of corruption, servility to donors, and disregard for academic standards” Subscribe to a free weekly electronic newsletter

from the Chronicle of Higher Education at http://chronicle.com/globalnewsletter

modern art: Modern College gave a new dimension to classical art defending its action as artistic licence

proof of corruption, servility to donors, and disregard for academic standards.

Modern College has given no informa-tion about the two women’s donations or the origin of their funds. Calls to the college went unanswered.

The Xinhua news agency reported that Athena’s plinth was erected as “lasting commemoration of [Ms Guo’s] major contribution to acquiring land to build the university.” Land sales are controlled by the Chinese government, so political connections remain a vital part of doing business.

“This is going too far away from the spirit of a university,” said one microb-logger, Cui Lifeng, on the Twitter-style site Sina Weibo.

“Are the professors crazy?” asked another commenter. “It seems flatter-ing their sponsor has outweighed common sense.”

Modern College is an easy target in part because it is a third-level institution called a san ben xue yuan, a university affiliate that admits students with lower scores for higher fees. For instance, it charges liberal-arts majors $1,580 a year, whereas its parent university’s fees are $611 for the same major.

Mr Cao, director of the college’s Cul-tural Office, was bullish at first: “Has anyone seen Nuwa or Athena personal-ly?” the official China Daily newspaper quoted him as saying. “It is totally art.”

Since then, the college has issued a statement saying officials there were “surprised” and “deeply regretful” about

the controversy. They insist that there has been no “money worship” and that education donors’ public-spiritedness deserves praise.

More peevishly, the statement explains artistic licence to the uninitiated: “Say-ing where the face of a nymph comes

from is not equal to saying that person is a nymph herself.”

The 10-point rebuttal has helpful pho-tos to prove that borrowing faces has a long, honourable lineage, including Raphael’s portrayal in a Vatican fresco of his hero Leonardo da Vinci as Plato. “Plato was a real person with mustache in many sculptures. Da Vinci had a beard, so the historical image was com-pletely changed, but no one criticised Raphael; they thought he made a master-piece. Some people do not understand artistic creation,” the statement says.

Nonetheless, the plaques on the base of the statues describing Athena, the col-lege’s “guardian spirit” — and by impli-cation Ms Guo — have been removed, according to Xinhua.



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Global research-and-development spending will increase by 5.2 per cent, to $1.4 tn By DaVID whEElEr

2012: Asia to Power Growth in Research & Development

An annual forecast of spending on research and development predicts that many Asian countries, including some that are not usually on the tip of prognosticators’ tongues, will creep up the ranks as world research powers this year.

The report says global research-and-development spending will increase by 5.2 per cent, to $1.4 tn, with much of the growth coming from Asian economies while the United States will remain largely stagnant.

The top five countries in terms of growth in research-and-development spending from 1996 to 2007 were China, Malay-sia, Thailand, Singapore, and Taiwan, data gathered for the fore-cast showed. Malaysia and Indonesia were new to the forecast’s listing of the top 40 countries in spending on research and development.

The “2012 Global R&D Funding Forecast” is part of an annual series that is a number cruncher’s delight. It is a collaborative effort between Battelle, which calls itself the “world’s largest independent research-and-development organisation,” and R&D Magazine, a publication of Advantage Business Media. The forecast combines original surveys and research with reviews of many of the reports, predictions, and data released in 2011.

Despite the pattern of strong Asian growth, the United States is still the global research giant, and will lead other countries with an expected 31 per cent share of the world’s research spending this year. While the increase in research-and-develop-ment support in the United States will barely outpace inflation,

coming of age: Asian countries are climbing up the ranks as world’s research powers

the R&D forecast predicts a big increase of 26.5 per cent, or $800 mn, in industry support for research at American univer-sities. That increase, which will be offset by falling government support, will bring industry backing for academic research and development to $3.9 bn and, the report says, is the result of companies embracing “open and collaborative innovation.”

As noted in a Chronicle article last summer, “Big Pharma Finds a Home on Campus,”pharmaceutical companies are slashing their in-house research and outsourcing it to universi-ties. That trend will continue this year. Pfizer, for example, regarded in one of the forecast’s surveys as a ‘global industry leader,’ will be cutting its research budget by nearly $2 bn in 2012 and relocating some research to Cambridge, England, where it can collaborate with scientists at the University of Cambridge and other research institutes in the region.

A separate study, done by the Economist Intelligence Unit for the Business Software Alliance and cited in the forecast, also shows Asia becoming more competitive in information-tech-nology research and development. In an annual IT Industry Competitiveness Index, done since 2007, Singapore moved up to third place behind the United States and Finland in 2011. India moved up 10 places to 34th place in the rankings, based on strengths across research and development and in higher education enrolment, and Malaysia jumped to 31st place.

The Economist Intelligence Unit report concludes that the “US remains the world’s best environment for developing IT talent,” but it noted some weaknesses in infrastructure, namely broadband penetration and security. US broadband penetra-tion, at 28 per cent, is behind global leaders, such as Canada, with rates above 35 per cent.

In the Battelle forecast, one odd fact stood out about the atti-tudes of American researchers: A survey of 713 researchers in 63 countries suggested that US researchers are less likely than their non-US counterparts to believe that solving global prob-lems will shape their future research.

The forecast hints that worldwide appreciation of the research role of universities is strengthening. Martin Grueber, a research leader for Battelle and of the authors of the survey said a variety of surveys done for the forecast show “there is a growing appre-ciation for the innovation potential stemming from corporate/academic R&D collaboration.”

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“I tried writing a few pages...I had written over 10,000 words”

CHaNaKya’S CHaNtS flItS BEtWEEN tWO agES: The main protagonist is one Pandit Gangasagar Mishra living two-and-a-half thousand years after old Bharat’s main politi-cal strategist Chanakya. Like his powerful prede-cessor, Mishra, too is a teacher in a small town of Kanpur. He draws inspiration from the master strategist Chanka-ya to get his protégée Chandini Gupta, a child from the slums who grows up to be a power-ful and beautiful woman, appointed to one of the highest offices in India. As with Chanakya, Mishra too feels no moral tug while bending rules. For him there’s no price too high to pay to get to the goal. He follows Chankya’s four mantras

Chanakya’s ChantEntrepreneur turned author Ashwin Sanghi wields his pen to knit this gripping political thriller inspired by Chankya’s mantras

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Democracy and Education John Dewey’s book addresses the challenge of providing quality public education in a ‘democratic society’. In this classic work Dewey calls for the complete renewal of public education. First published in 1916, the book is regarded as the seminal work on public education.Author: John DeweyPublisher: MacmillanPrice: $27.95

(chants) Saam, Daam, Dand and Bhed (Equality, Enticement, Punishment and Sowing Dissen-sion) — with a relish that makes the book an excellent read.

The book keeps the reader hooked to the time-less political drama. It is a page-turner, and keeps the reader’s interest alive in the stratagems of the mind game being played out by the lead protagonists of the book.

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tECH INSIDER | MAlA BhArgAvA

tOO large to hold against your ear; too small to be a tablet in the league of Apple’s iPad. Yet, the 5.3-inch Samsung Galaxy Note is basking in a sudden burst of interest. It does fit in a pocket, but it is of course nicer in a handbag or a briefcase within easy reach. While some are instantly dismissing it as a hybrid that neither works as a phone nor as a tablet, others see exactly how, coupled with a Bluetooth headset, it could be the ultimate convenient all-in-one gadget. The moment you hold the Note, you understand why it’s the size that it is. The device is really suited to someone on the go — someone who has just that perfect slot in their life-

style. Through a rushed day, you can reach out for it and make a quick video call, tackle your email, read your quota of news, do some light work with documents, or relax with a book, some videos or a round or two of a game you can’t resist. The Note also has a stylus or

‘S-Pen’ tucked into it. It’s a fine-tipped stylus and easy to use and there are even applications made specially to leverage its use. But if you’re considering picking up one of these, there are a few things to consider: First, what other devices do you own or plan to buy? If your phone is a large-ish smartphone, the Note is close to redundant. If you use an iPad or netbook, it’s a superfluous unless you plan to use it extensively for something or in a certain situation, while travelling, for instance. Or, it can be the second device you prefer at the office, apart from a laptop. iPads tend to get personalised in a family, so if you rarely get to use them, the Note could be an alternative. The second thing to keep in mind is that the Note runs on Android which can annoy anyone who isn’t comfortable with fid-dling around with ‘techy’ things. Little changes if you use just the basic applications, but as you get a little experimental, you need to play around with settings and apps to tame the device — one for which you will be paying a little over Rs 30,000.

Take Note of That!

Mala Bhargava is Editorial Director at 9.9 Media and a technology writer. She is also the author of That’s IT, a regular column on personal computers in Business World.


legacy

Daya Krishna

Any account of Daya Krishna as a philosopher must begin with an account of him as a person, as for him life was philosophy writ large. Philosophy in his practice related to one’s entire being and bearing, body and consciousness and was not just an academic training of the mind. For him it remained always meta and

transdisciplinary, an exploration that must subsume all of life’s concerns, whether politico-ethical thought or poetic-musical expression. He remained happily unswayed by fashions, especially those that breezed in from the North Atlantic world including structuralism and post-structuralism. His critiques of these were relentless as also of the attempt to postulate ‘icons’ from the East such as the Buddha. As one of his letters puts it:

Derrida is dead; so is Foucault. Are you still busy with them? Talking of Derrida, have you seen his book Eyes of the University: Right to Philosophy 2? Derrida complaining and moaning about the situation in “knowledge” and the attitude to it sitting among the ruins all around him of the “House of Knowledge” which he himself helped in destroying. And, what about [the] Buddha? Are you still “suffering” from his perception of suffering as the “real” reality of everything? Let there be Laughter and Joy all around. (Daya Krishna to Prabodh Parikh, November 14, 2006)

Daya Krishna was for me a father, a friend and a soulmate. I seem to have known him all my life. He had come to live and teach at the University of Sagar in Madhya Pradesh. Even in those early years of his career, he had an ascetic’s appearance that stayed with him through his life. Kurta-pajama is now ‘ethnic’. But this was not the case from the 1950s to the 1980s when western clothing was more usual for Indian men. He was unfashionable also in dis-tancing himself from the fashionable leftist stance of Indian intellectuals and hence, on the wrong side of the postcolonial knowledge-power structure that dispensed patronage.

Daya Krishna defied fashion again in his critical engagement with Indian philosophical traditions of the 80s that resulted in a period of exceptional creativity. The book, India’s Intel-lectual Traditions: Attempts at Conceptual Reconstructions was a collective product demonstrat-ing what he called “Jaipur experiment”. His last work is a Jaipur edition of the Rigveda, a powerful act of re-reading. In the interim, he became a crucial voice within the Indian Coun-cil for Philosophical Research that sought to enter into a Samvada with the living philosoph-ical traditions of India including Kashmir Saivism and Navya Nyaya. Thinking creatively, as he put it, meant freedom also “to free one’s conceptual imagination from the unconscious constraints of one’s own conceptual tradition.”

“A philosophy is usually characterised as spiritual or non-spiritual because of the way it

conceives of the nature of reality and not...highest ideal for man”—Daya Krishna

(1924-2007)

May 10, 2008 Posthumously Awarded ICPR’s

Lifetime Achievement Award

1990 Takes over as Editor of

Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical

Research (JICPR)

Works published

2004The Nyaya Sutra: A New

Commentary on an Old Text

1979 Political Development: A Critical Perspective

1955The Nature of Philosophy

(The article has been contributed by Dr Shail

Mayaram, Professor, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi, daughter of

Prof Daya Krishna on a special request by Team Edu)

Philosopher Personified

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