Foreign varsity entry plan |
| Basant Kumar Mohanty |
| New Delhi, Jan. 12: The Centre plans to let foreign universities open campuses in India and is working out the details, top government sources have told The Telegraph. Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a meeting on June 22 last year that discussed both legislative and executive routes to making this a possibility before referring the matter to the Niti Aayog, the sources said. They added that the Niti Aayog had suggested one executive and two legislative routes, which the human resource development ministry would soon examine to decide the best option. The executive route seems the likeliest choice. India now lacks a legal framework to allow foreign educational institutions to set up campuses. The University Grants Commission Act says that only universities set up by Parliament or a state legislature, and those declared deemed universities by the government, can award degrees. Among legislative measures, the Centre can have the UGC Act amended to allow foreign campuses that will operate as full-fledged universities in India, or introduce a new bill allowing them to function as deemed universities. The executive route involves getting the UGC to notify a regulation recognising campuses opened by foreign universities as deemed universities. The UPA government had made two unsuccessful attempts to allow foreign campuses in India. In 2010, then human resource development minister Kapil Sibal had introduced a bill in Parliament but a lack of consensus prevented its passage. A parliamentary standing committee had said the provision allowing only not-for-profit foreign institutions to set up campuses would deter the best institutions. Nevertheless, under the government's advice, the UGC had in 2013 notified rules allowing foreign universities to set up campuses as not-for-profit companies in India and award degrees. This time the law ministry raised objections, asking whether a foreign university could offer a degree without a specific law enacted by Parliament. A previous Congress government in 1995 too had introduced a similar bill that ran into political opposition. After Smriti Irani became the minister in 2014, her ministry prepared a bill for foreign campuses but it was not sent to the cabinet. Furqan Qamar, secretary-general of the Association of Indian Universities, which decides the recognition of foreign degrees, said the UGC Act does not distinguish between national and foreign institutions in the award of deemed university status. "There shouldn't be any problem in allowing foreign institutions to operate as deemed universities. But the existing UGC regulation on deemed universities needs modifications," Qamar said. The present regulation says that an institution registered as a society or a trust or a Section 8 Company (not-for-profit company) can be granted deemed university status. Qamar said global institutions might not want to register as a society or trust or a company in India to open a campus. "International institutions will prefer to come on the basis of their own strength and reputation, not as a newly formed society in India," he said. Qamar said the best institutions globally were not-for-profit institutions. He added that it did not seem advisable to allow for-profit foreign institutions to set up campuses in India. |
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Foreign varsity entry plan
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