To boost the country’s service sector, the Government is looking forward to open its education and legal services for foreigners. Commerce Secretary Rita Teaotia said that work is under progress for opening education and legal services for foreign players.
On explaining the country’s approach to open education sector, she said, in the beginning, opening online courses could be an option. “IGNOU is doing something. Some professional bodies are also offering online courses. So, when we have such strong technical institutions with high reputation, can they do more of opening online courses and make those accessible to other countries. So, this could be one step,” she said.
The Department of Commerce will first permit the multi-professional firms to come in, and to allow them to increase size of the firms. The committee of Secretaries (CoS) is discussing the matter of opening up of these two sectors.
The government is in consultation with the Bar Council of India and Society for Indian Law Firms (SILF) to open up legal services sector to foreigners in a calibrated manner. The UK and the US have been pushing India to open up the sector to foreign firms.
