Education is the key for the development process of an entire nation and can help in taking the country to global heights as a leader in the forefront, says Prof Mahendra P Lama, Pro-Vice Chancellor, Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), in conversation with Rozelle Laha

From being the founding Vice Chancellor of Sikkim University to Pro-Vice Chancellor of IGNOU, please share your experience as a teacher over the past 21 years.
Our country requires good institutions, primarily because students opting for higher education are very bright, targeted and forward. We need to channelise their creative minds, and their constructive and collective strength. As the founding Vice Chancellor of Sikkim University, my first aim was to build a national institution that would take care of the local youth, their needs, and an institution that would cater to the entire nation. Despite of the immense support from the central government and MHRD, we have failed to give good institutions to the people of the Northeast that are able to cater to the talented crowd there.
India has a huge role to play globally as far as education is concerned. The British, Americans, Chinese, Japanese have been using education as a very strong instrument in their foreign policy. While they are talking of hard powers like about atom bombs and tanks, but at the same time, they also give ample significance to education as a key soft power. Indians have not been able to play much on the soft power game despite of a strong historical background in education. Indian Universities should strive to promote the national interest to the global world.

 What are the major determinants of quality for education?
There is a huge difference between what we produce and what is required. When we think of quality in higher education, we should think of getting access of the same to all communities thus creating the right people to cater to the needs of the nation and transforming India into a major education hub by reaping the benefits of diverse culture, demography and geography available in the country.
The condition of the educational institutes in the country is very poor. The number of higher education institutes is insufficient to cater to a population of more than 100 crore. Availability of a university per thousand of population in India is one of the lowest in the world as compared to China, Japan or America.
On a positive note, despite of the state of Indian institutions, foreign students and faculty do come to our country. So, it is evident that they are willing to be here. We only need to create a strong strategy and ensure quality to attract more such people here.

Sikkim University offers some unique courses unlike other universities. What inspired you to introduce such courses and how have students responded to these courses?
Most of the universities are teaching more or less similar courses these days. In Sikkim University, we did not want to offer courses available in other parts of the country. So, we established the School of Sustainable Development, School of Peace, Conflict and Human Security Studies, School of Indigenous and Folk Studies, School of Global Studies among many others. These courses attracted applicants from countries like China, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan and India.
Most of our present day conflicts are related to natural resource management (land, water, mineral resources), but very few universities in our country offer any course on natural resource management. Similarly, India is a country that shares borders with China, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and coastal border with Sri Lanka, how many universities in the country offer courses on border? We at Sikkim University realised that with new set of courses, we will not only attract students from India but also abroad.

Please throw some light on the scenario of education in the Northeastern states with reference to the Northeast Region Document.
Most people perceive that the Northeast is all about insurgency, violence and terrorism, but the fact is that people resorting to such activities comprise of less than one percent of the population living there. They do not represent the entire population. We must establish institutes in the region that would attract more students from other parts of the country who can then carry the message that Northeast is not only about insurgency. Iis also about people, food, culture, intellectual resources and heritage.
Many institutes in the Northeast that were built by the British continue to remain robust, but post independence not much was done towards building good institutes.
The Northeast Region document (released by Dr Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister of India, in the presence of all the Chief Ministers of the Indian states) lays ample emphasis on improvement of education, health and infrastructure of the region. We also have a Northeastern Council which is equivalent to the Planning Commission of India and Ministry of Development of Northeastern Region, but nothing much happened in terms of improvement. Government of India has a Look East Policy as a part of its main foreign policy plan. But, in the policy, where is the Northeast? When they look towards the east, they talk only of Southeast Asian countries like Malayasia, Singapore, Korea whereas the first thing they should look at is their own Northeast. The Northeast is the gateway to the Southeast Asian countries and the Northeast of the home country should be discussed more seriously.

Higher education should channelise creative minds and collective strength of youngsters

What role can universities like IGNOU play in making education more inclusive in the country and what is your vision?
IGNOU is the only institution in the country which is truly a people’s university, as it has reached to the remotest of remote areas across many communities. We aim to reach out to the millions of students who still don’t have access to higher education; to the unconventional catchment areas within India and play a critical role by imparting education with help of technology. We also aim to spread the concept of open and distance learning system across the globe.

What is your take on teachers’ training programmes in the country?
India needs quality teachers. After the qualification of Bachelors of Education was made compulsory part of school teachers’ training by March 2015, we realised that 80 percent of our teachers are not trained. To add to it, when educational boards like CBSE and the various state governments planned to train the teachers, we gathered that there are no teachers’ training institutes either.
So, with the help of skill training institutes and private institutes, IGNOU plans to train as many teachers as possible in the coming months. However, with such a huge demand in place, our efforts will be able to cater to not more than two to five percent of the need.

As an eminent educationist, where do you see India five years from now? Are we headed in the right direction?
Yes. Policy wise, we are heading towards the right direction, but implementation wise, we still have a long way to go. In my opinion, a few good institutes will take the lead in making India an education hub.
There is a major lack of serious debate, discourse and discussion on higher education. The higher education system should not be led by the government. It should be led by the demand of students and aspirants. As of now all higher education related discussions are primarily triggered from the government’s end, which again is a major deviation from our foreign counterparts.

east is a sign of nationl integration, the reverse migration would have justified it better

What are your future plans for IGNOU?
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has signed an agreement with the African countries to set up the India- Africa Virtual University. The three partners from India i.e. the Ministry of External Affairs, Ministry of Human Resources Development and IGNOU, together are launching a pilot project early next year. This initiative would help us understand the African countries, renew our relations with them and make a very strong education base there. We also plan to have similar initiatives with our neighbouring countries.

Dr Achyuta Samanta, founder KIIT University and Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) in conversation with Rozelle Laha, shares his vision as an education leader in the private sector

What is your vision with KIIT University?
KIIT University was started 16 years back in 1987. The progress made by us over these years with respect to infrastructure, ambience, environment, academia, student performance, student achievement, quality of faculty and the students is laudable. However, we have a long way to go as there is no limit to quality enhancement.
We will focus on quality faculty, quality placements, quality research publications and consultancy in the coming days, We are laying maximum thrust on research publications and consultancy in order to make a mark for KIIT and to raise its level of acceptance among people.

How do you ensure the quality of faculty at KIIT ?
We hire M-Tech graduates and PhD students from different IITs and NITs across the country as faculty at KIIT. We usually visit the old IITs during their campus placements. We also advertise in newspapers for faculty recruitment. We also try to ensure good pay and good working environment and ambience to our faculty members.

Please tell us something about employability of KIIT graduates. How do you attract corporate to your campus?
Despite of locational disadvantages, the employability rate has been consistently commendable at KIIT. We have Q A& been achieving over 92 percent placements almost every year across all the streams, while the remaining eight percent generally opt out of the placements process.
But, we need quality placements oncampus with more multi-national companies to ensure better salary for KIIT graduates. As of now, the highest package is around `17 lakh per annum and the lowest is about `3.5 lakh.
As of now, only seven to eight MNCs visit our campus. Our aim is to attract at least 30 to 40 such companies to our campus every year. We are convinced that our rigorous efforts, quality teaching and well-trained graduates attract the industry to hire from the campus.

What is your strategy of promoting KIIT among aspirants and corporates? Does being located in a non-education hub affect KIIT admissions and placements in any way?
Our acceptance among the students and parents is commendable. Like most private universities, KIIT too conducts KIITEE for admissions to various courses. in the university. As per last year data, 1,60,000 students appeared for KIITEE across the country. Out of these, 42,000 students competed for only 100 medical seats (out of which 15 percent is reserved for management quota) on offer. Surprisingly, 85% of these students are from outside Odisha with maximum student representation from North India. We host foreign students from 15 different countries on our campus.

What is the strategy for yielding better research output at KIIT ?
We have built the advance central research centre at KIIT, wherein we are offer `10 crore as seed money to the advance research centre. We also encourage faculty members already involved in research and consultancy to be more engaged in the same in different ways. At the same time, we are also invite quality scientists as faculty members on our campus. KIIT’s School of Biotechnology is perhaps one of the best in the country with excellent research and laboratories almost at par with any other private or government institution in the country.

What persuaded you to create Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS)?
KISS is a home to 20, 000 tribal children of Odisha who are educated from KG (kindergarten) to PG (Post-graduation) under one roof. It was started with the vision of eradicating poverty through education. KISS has not only become a beauty of the entire world but is also accepted by the Ministry of Tribal Welfare, Government of India as the most successful model as it is a fully-free, fullyresidential largest institute for the tribal children across the world. Once a child joins KISS, he leaves this place only after completing his higher studies with a good job in hand. We have achieved a zero drop-out rate at KISS.
I consider half education is more harmful than no education. We promote our KISS students to be selected in the IITs, IIMs and NITs. We bear the tuition fee on their behalf to encourage them to pursue higher education.

How did you conceive the idea of opening KISS in different districts and across the country?
After a successful experiment of the model in Bhubaneshwar, I decided to extend it to other parts of the country to reach out to real poor children of the country. This initiative, I believe, can convert children from being liabilities to becoming assets of the society. I have the vision of educating 200, 000 students across different KISS centres of the country in the coming 10 years. I would be establishing at least 100 schools in different states with the help of either the state governments of the respective states or some corporate.

Education is the key to eradicating poverty, lethargy, naxalism and every possible issue that plagues the society

There is an increasing urge among most institutions to open up overseas campuses. Do you have any such plans for KIIT University?
As KIIT policy, we do not establish any regional campuses. We strive to maintain quality only in the Bhubaneswar campus and hold no plans to establish additional campuses across the country. We have adopted such a strategy as we believe that inability to bring in good quality even in one regional campus can affect the overall reputation of the whole brand.