Year of inception: 2004
CEO: Vittal Bhandary
Head office: Bangalore
Address: Learning Edge India Pvt Ltd, # 742, 7th cross, near BDA complex, 3rd block, Koramangala,
Bangalore – 560036
Website: www.littleelly.com

Little Elly is a noble initiative of Learning Edge India Pvt Ltd in association with Glen Tree, UK, the pioneers in serving the learning needs of kids for nearly a decade. The group follows the unique methodology where in every child gets to learn without being made to feel he or she is being taught.

School’s Philosophy
The school’s mission is to facilitate the learning process that makes every child cheerful, independent and successful in the future. The school believes in making “Teaching a Joy” and “Learning a pleasure”.

USP
Little Elly is a concept preschool, which has its own unique approach, using an integrated curriculum as a base for meaningful, experiential and creative learning. The facilities are designed as concept spaces which promote the children’s creativity and autonomy. Children can play, explore, run around, learn, discover and dream in the Early Learning Program (ELP) room, the Music and Movement stage, the Montessori Space, the Creative Corner and in the Play Area.
Providing a high quality education for children in their early growth stage yields significant long term benefits. The group strives to provide quality education opportunity to people from all walks of life. The group has a higher goal – the desire to do something rewarding and make a difference in the lives of children, family and their neighbourhood.

With the Apex court’s rule rendering AICTE to be an advisory body and not regulator, many technical institutes of the country agree on the need to be regulated

All Indian Council for Technical Education (AICTE) – the apex regulatory authority for technical education in the country is now merely an advisory body. The Supreme Court, on April 25, 2013 ruled that AICTE will not have the authority to control or regulate the university affiliated professional and technical colleges of the country.
The judgment has left most institutes across the country to function without any supervisor and might lead to disarray in their functioning soon.
Most institutes in the country agree that there should be a regulatory body in place to put a framework in place and to ensure that institutes under its supervision adhere to the rules and regulations set by it.
“The decision of restricting the influence of AICTE as a regulator is definitely going to hamper the quality of technical education in the country. Before diluting the regulatory powers of an existing body, the ministry should have put up an alternative option in place. It is very important to have a regulator who can control and decide on fee fixation and quality,” said Prateek Sanghvi, Vice President, Sanghvi Institute of Management and Science, Indore.
As per reports from the ministry,“The Higher Education and Research (HE&R) Bill, 2011 intended to create the National Commission for Higher Education & Research (NCHER) for determination, coordination, maintenance and continued enhancement of standards of higher education and research.”
This commission would comprise of members from existing regulatory bodies like University Grants Commission (UGC) and All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), setting aside regulatory bodies in the fields of medicine and law, with the power to put in place regulations for medical education and legal education.
A Press Information Bureau report in March 2013 mentioned that despite a general consensus on the need to establish an overarching regulatory body at the top, the setting up of the NCHER was specifically opposed by the State Governments of Bihar, Kerala, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.
As Prateek Sanghvi pointed out, “with the NCHER still on papers, the ministry should not have dissolved AICTE’s power to ensure authenticity of technical education was intact”
AICTE was the affiliating body to nearly 12,000 institutes across the country offering technical education. But, now, with the apex court judgment, around 1, 000 institutes come under the supervision of the council. It also regulated the number of institutes being opened up across the country and approved the number of seats to be offered by these institutes.
“Some regulatory body should be there to supervise. It is good for the institution’s management. Compilation of performance based data should be done timely. A regulator ensures that a goal is set and all institutions work towards that end result. Also, a regulator checks on the number of institutes and the locations in which they are being opened up,” said Dr Rupesh P Vasani, Principal, SAL Institute of Technology & Engineering Research, Ahmedabad.
AICTE ensured a reporting mechanism of an institute’s performance through a format of mandatory disclosures. This procedure of declaring achievements by any institution was applicable to all management and technical institutions in the country.
However, some institutes opine that despite of AICTE being in place, “The mushroom growth of unauthorised Bschools led to price war with absolute dilution of standards. A strict vigil is required in checking them and to ensure their closure both to help gullible students and undeserving faculty,” said Prof Dr V G Chari, Associate Vice President, Siva Sivani Institute of Management, Secunderabad. He added that approved management institutes should be provided more autonomy in terms of their geographical expansion including global affiliations. Joint programs and dual programs in collaboration with foreign B-schools/ universities should be given importance to nurture global ambitions of students. Similarly, Dr Rupesh Vasani also suggests that AICTE may act as a regulator, but fixing the curriculum should be there in the hands of the institutes. “The institutes understand the need of a particular course in their own state. For instance, shipping course is important in Gujarat, but we have not been able to offer it as there is no such AICTE approved course in place.”

Before diluting the regulatory powers of an existing body, the ministry should have put up analternative option in place Prateek Sanghvi, Vice President, Sanghvi Institute of Management, Indore

The Higher Education and Research (HE&R) Bill, 2011 intendes to create the National Commission for Higher Education & Research (NCHER) for determination, coordination, maintenance and continued enhancement of standards of higher education and research

AICTE had done a reasonably good job of spreading higher and technical  education across the country Chetan S Wakalkar, Group Director, Indira Group of Institutes, Pune

Despite debates on how much power should be there with the apex regulator, the fact remains that a regulator is needed to ensure that the institutes function in array so as to ensure a basic level of quality education being offered by them. Chetan S Wakalkar, Group Director, Indira Group of Institutes, Pune says that “We are currently not clear as to how the Government would be restructuring education regulation India. Hence, it would be difficult to make an accurate statement on whether removal of AICTE’s regulatory powers is good or bad. But AICTE had done a reasonably good job of spreading higher and technical education across the country. AICTE had mentored private initiative in this space thus at least giving thousands of youth an opportunity to technical education and thus some sort of a career option.”
To justify the role of AICTE in promoting quality in technical education, Prateek Sanghvi marked that “All good work done by AICTE in terms of quality improvement of institutes would go to vein with institutes been given the power to function at their own whims.”

A regulator ensures that a goal is set and all institutions work towards that end result Dr Rupesh P Vasani, Principal, SAL Institute of Technology & Engineering Research, Ahmedabad

The mushroom growth of unauthorised B-schools led to price war with absolute dilution of standards Prof Dr V G Chari, Associate Vice President, Siva Sivani Institute of Management, Secunderabad

No bill has been prepared to amend the existing AICTE Act thus making the council an advisory body and not a regulator for the coming months driving technical education towards a confused road.

So what makes it different from all other platforms in the online  education arena? How is it changing the ed-tech scenario in India? Pragya Gupta, ENN talks to Harman Singh, the young CEO of WizIQ, and a passionate teacher himself

WizIQ first came into picture in 2007 and has since grown into a popular online education portal, with its virtual classroom technology that is specially tailored to suit the specific needs of 250,000 teachers from over 150 countries

By the end of a regular day at WizIQ, there have been 2160 hours of online teaching, in a total of 1606 public courses, with 567710 uploaded content files, and 11118 enrolments. More than 3 million people learning and teaching on a platform so robust, is a feat in itself

The world is witnessing a mushrooming growth of online education companies. Do you have a magic formula that makes you stand out?
WizIQ’s entire business and product design is based on the underlying belief that good education is driven by teachers – not technology, not content, but teachers. That is a simple thing to overlook but if you think deeply, it can have a profound impact on the industry and that’s what our magic formula is.

How are you helping teachers adopt online education? Do you offer onsite training?
I would not call it adopting. I believe the whole debate over whether or not to adopt technology into education is pointless. The new web is here, and there is no point resisting it. The right thing to do is to embrace it with a disruptive technological innovation that would define and streamline the otherwise haphazard growth of this phenomenon. And that is exactly what we are doing at WizIQ!
We provide teachers with free demos of the product and even help them with the start-up of their online courses. Wiz- IQ Support is 24×7 operational. We have a comprehensive collection of free white papers, ebooks and case studies for teachers to use and implement. WizIQ Blog is another happening portal. We have some very experienced and popular teachers as writers. All our posts are extensively written for the sole benefit of teachers.
We at WizIQ believe that everyone can teach something.

How courses on WizIQ are different from the courses on other platforms?
We identified four components that were crucial for classroom experience:
• Live, video based interaction between the teacher and the students
• Integrated Content – mostly in multimedia format
• Online Assessments
• Teacher-Student asynchronous discussions
While products were available for some of these individual components, there was no product available, which integrated all four components to provide a comprehensive online classroom experience. WizIQ merges the four components seamlessly to recreate the classroom experience online.
WizIQ Virtual Classroom is easy to use – it works from any web browser on PCs, iPad and Android tablets with web-browsers; is available in 19 languages including languages such as Arabic and Hebrew. All one needs is an Internet connection!

How has India accustomed to this new paradigm in education?
The infrastructural growth of a country determines how fast it enters into the digital age. For India, it is slow, but sure. Indian universities, colleges, tutoring companies and individual teachers are openly embracing the concept of online education, even open education! Premier institutes like few IIT’s launched their certificate courses on WizIQ. ISM Dhanbad has a certificate course on International Business Management, also on WizIQ.

“Indian universities, colleges, tutoring companies and individual teachers are openly embracing the concept of online education, even  open education! Premier institutes like few IIT’s launched their certificate courses on WizIQ

Everyone has a social networking presence these days. Then why not a social teaching and learning presence too? And then what is stopping the kids in rural India from being taught by the teachers in Delhi or even New York? Nothing at all!
This is a new dawn for Indian education sector and WizIQ is proud to be a part of this movement.

Do you see Universities in India as potential partners or competitors?
WizIQ is building the online education platform in partnership with Colleges and Universities. WizIQ brings the platform, market knowledge and all the support required to deliver education online but WizIQ does not have the expertise in curriculum and the instructors. What we say to the Universities is, do what you do best, that is, teach and let us take care of everything else!
We want to work with Universities across India to take online education to the whole world. We need to support each other at every step.
Our Academic Liaison team connects with leaders in higher education, provides them with training and support and helps them launch their certified courses online. This is a win-win model for everyone because even the students who earlier did not have access to quality education can now be reached via the online medium.

Can you share some more details about the platform?
WizIQ is an online education platform that offers SaaS based virtual classroom software for teachers, trainers, colleges and universities, high schools, and training and tutoring centres around the world. WizIQ has over 250,000 teachers and 3.5 million students using the platform in more than 150 countries around the world.
WizIQ provides tools for teachers to deliver online education in online or blended learning formats, connect with students, share educational content, deliver live online classes and facilitate highly engaging learning experiences. WizIQ works on PCs, iPad and Android tablets; and is available in 19 languages including Arabic and Hebrew. Universities and colleges can launch distance education programs, again charging if they wish or integrating the programs into existing educational offerings.
On WizIQ, students can learn anytime, anywhere at a pace that is comfortable to them. WizIQ offers learning in new, engaging, unprecedented ways for students regardless of time, location, or socioeconomic status.
(Kalyan Sarkar, Director of Academic Liaison can be reached at +91-9216405405 or +91- 9897072888 or email at kalyan@wiziq.com or academics@wiziq.com)

Veena Raizada,
Director- Education, Next Education India

The human society is passing through a crisis. Violence is becoming an everyday occurrence, which is a matter of concern. The inhuman acts of violence, especially against women and children, the brutal killings of innocent people, terrorism, and injustice are the daily bitter pills of a common man. We seem to be in a state of hyper drive. Stress levels have turned human beings into shorttempered impatient devils indulging in road rage, conflicts and arguments, disrupting peace all around. Even educational institutions at the school or higher level are plagued by violence. It is time to reflect, introspect and act towards building a culture of peace and harmony not only within human societies but also with Mother Nature.
The quest for peace that began with the establishment of the UN in 1945 has been followed up by recommendations, declarations and action plans for education for international understanding, human rights and democracy. The General Assembly of the UN designated 2001-2010 as the International Decade for Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for Children of the World, supported by guidelines to implement education for peace in the education curricula. However, the mission for peace is yet to be accomplished.
The effort to evolve a culture of peace and non-violence needs a whole-hearted, participatory and holistic approach to every action plan. Hence, a common platform that connects people and strengthens human bonding across the globe is the utmost need for the success of every agenda for peace and technology has that potential.
The 21st century, the digital era, is an amazing age of remarkable ease of accessibility and connectivity. Technology is all-pervasive with smartphones in our pockets. The present generation is at ease with ever-changing technology. The prospects of the world of tomorrow at peace, therefore, seem to be bright.
Technology by itself cannot create peace, but can definitely be a powerful tool to combat the culture of war and violence. ICTs tools, as such, are neutral.
What makes the difference is the content, imparting strategies and monitoring progression of the action plans.
The root causes of social evils that erode the pathways to peace are mainly poverty and illiteracy. Education is the key to make people self-reliant, and empower them by knowledge to live with respect and dignity in peace and harmony with all, including Mother Earth.
In its constitution, the UNESCO states, “Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed.”
A culture of peace, therefore, needs to be initiated in the curricula from the primary stages, and carried forward till the higher levels. Sensitising human beings to respect life, cultural identity, and the cherished values of love and respect by every religion and culture is of paramount importance. Carefully designed curricula content, meaningful teaching and persistent efforts will pave the path to peace.

The root causes of social evils that erode the pathways to peace are mainly poverty and illiteracy. Education is the key to make people self-reliant, and empower them by knowledge to live with respect and dignity in peace and harmony with all, including Mother Earth”

ICTs for Education for all: Education as a dynamic process that inculcates respect for life, create awareness of human rights and equity, promote understanding of global problems, environmental protection, appreciate cultural diversity, rejects violence and resolve conflicts through dialogue and communication is the ultimate magic mantra for transforming hearts to have peaceful world is education for all. Education of girls needs even more priority as the dropout rate is high.
ICTs in education are already playing a significant role in reaching out to all. Online education, distance education courses, e-Classrooms and mobile educationare some of them. A lot more needs to be done as the millennium goals of education for all are yet to be achieved.

ICTs for awareness of human rights:Youth for Human Rights International maintains that children who do not know their rights are vulnerable and easy prey for unscrupulous elements. The statistics of the loss of dignity and life through child abuse, gang violence, and child labour are staggeringly high. The Child abuse report for 2007 conducted among over 12,000 children indicates that in India,almost two-thirds of children are victims of child abuse. Over 50 percent face some kind of sexual abuse, and half of them suffer emotional abuse. Official figures indicate that there are over 12 million child workers in India.
Hence, education for awareness and understanding of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights will definitely be a big help. The challenge is to develop a thoughtful action plan and know how to execute and promote the relevance for a peace on planet earth.

ICTs for nurturing cultural diversity: Widespread high-speed networks of technology probably brought the world together faster than desired. This lead to inter-cultural connects without human societies getting enough time to understand and appreciate the cultural identity of every individual across the globe. Emerging conflicts and misunderstanding among human societies could be seen as the risks of technologies. Yet, the potential of opportunities cannot be undermined.

ICTs for environmental protection: Rapidly disappearing rain forests, carbon footprints, shattering climate changes, increasing levels of carbon dioxide, mass extinction of species are some of the problems that mankind is facing today.
Overpopulation across the globe is the biggest environmental problem. As per UN statistics, the world population grew by 30 percent – almost1.6 billion people – in the last two decades, with India marking the highest increase of 350 million. It is essential for mankind to address the critical problems now rather than facing the consequences later. Unless every human being pledges to do the right thing at the individual level, nothing will work.

Conclusion: ICTs can be used effectively for collaboration and co-operation to have communities across the globe have meaningful communication to foster a culture of peace and non-violence to save mankind and Mother Earth

Amit Kumar,
President, Cyberfort Technologies

IT is playing dominant role in the current economy and trade. As IT has simplified our daily work in all aspect, it has also called for cyber threat. Cyber criminals have found a new way to invade the economy and terrorise the nation with the use of IT. It has shaken many nations in the past and has made the government to think seriously about this unknown terrorist and secure and preserve the prosperity of their nation. To combat this cyber crime, nation need cyber security expert to work and secure the existing platform so that prosperity flourish in the livelihood of individual people. Though how, India has proven its IT super power across the nation, still it require five lakh cybersecurity professionals by 2015 to support its fast growing internet economy as per an estimate by the union ministry of information technology. These jobs will come up across industries. The financial sector alone is expected to hire over two lakh people while telcos, utility sectors, power, oil & gas, airlines, government (law & order and e-governance) will hire the rest. A large number of these jobs will be around cyberpolicing and ethical hacking, to check for network vulnerabilities. The need for cyber experts has grown exponentially as the country is heading towards an internet explosion mostly fuelled by e-Commerce, e-Banking, e-Governance and the social media.
Today, there are more than two billion people online, who need to be protected. Cyber attacks are already happening on a daily basis in the world and as we grow more and more ‘connected’, the threats also become more complex and difficult. On Facebook, there are 50 million Indian users and even if a small fraction of them click unsuspectingly on a malevolent but seemingly ordinary link, you have that many computers opened up to risk and infection. The freedom of cyber space is just as crucial to the debate as its protection is.
The University Grant Commission (UGC) and the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) have asked Universities and Technical Institutions to introduce Cyber Security and Information Security as a subject at the Under-Graduate and Post-Graduate levels. This was stated by Minister of State for Human Resource Development, Dr Shashi Tharoor in Lok Sabha.
Based on the recommendations of the Task Force on the National Security System constituted on the direction of the Cabinet Committee on Security, the UGC has requested the Vice Chancellors of all the Universities to ensure that Cyber Security/ Information Security is introduced as a subject in the universities and technical institutions at the under-graduate and post-graduate levels. AICTE has intimated that following the recommendations of the Task Force, it has made provisions in the Approval Handbook that out of the two divisions allotted at the Post-Graduate and Post-Diploma levels, one shall be on Cyber Security or in Cyber Security related courses in the Computer/ IT branches of Engineering/ Technology.
Quoting a Gartner report in its letter,UGC said, “The country’s information security market is expected to grow by 18% to reach `1,415 crore in 2013 on the back of increased spending by companies to secure their information assets. Despite a continuing economic slowdown that has been putting pressure on IT budgets around the world, cyber security spending globally would continue on an upward trajectory, reaching $86 billion in 2016, up from $60 billion in 2012.”

India needs five lakh cybersecurity professionals by 2015 to support its fast growing Internet economy

National Skill Development Council is also working with partners to develop cyber security talent. Nasscom along with DSCI currently operates eight cyberlabs in Bangalore, Chennai, Pune, Thane, Mumbai, Gurgaon, Delhi and Hyderabad. We train the police on forensic, cyber crime detection and tell them how to register cybercrimes, secure evidences as per the IT Act.
If combating malware, hackers and cyber crimes are your passion, this is the right time to be a cyber security expert. Amidst this cloud of cyber crimes, there is a silver lining that comes in the form of job opportunities for students in the field of information security. Recognising the dearth of trained cyber security experts, the Indian government has expanded the career prospects in this field by announcing to train five lakh cyber warriors in the next five years to boost e-Defense. A government-private sector plan, this initiative aims at beefing up India’s cyber security, as we face a shortfall of five lakh such experts, despite our reputation of being an IT and software powerhouse. The government also intends to introduce specialised cyber security-related curriculum in engineering and management courses and establish Institute of Cyber Security Professionals of India.
Security stats
Contrary to the importance given to network security and threat prevention in countries like the UK, US and China, India is lagging behind in identifying the need for this scarce skill-set. The rising spate of cyber attacks has alerted government and private organizations, thus generating a huge demand for information security professionals to safeguard and monitor their network and systems.
“Be it an organisation or an individual, everybody wants to ensure the safety of their system, thus, relying heavily on information security experts. Government departments and security agencies too demand large number of cyber security professionals,” says Gaurav Raj, a certified Ethical Hacker. As per industry experts, job opportunities in this field have outnumbered trained professionals. IT security with ethical hacking skills is the most promising career to be in, with challenges and excitement every day of the work. IT is the back bone of any nation in now days. There is a huge shortage of IT security manpower, only 556 professionals are available with respect to five lakhs of jobs in IT security field in India. Recently, government has floated vacancy for the recruitment in Intelligence Bureau for cyber security expert. It shows and opened up the vacancies in this emerging and most promising career in the field of Cyber Security.”

Required skills
Elaborating on the skill-set required to succeed in the field of information security, Bezawada Bruhadeshwar, International Institute Information Technology, Hyderabad, says, “It’s a field that requires your keen interest, professional training and thorough knowledge of operating systems, programming, networks and protocols. Cyber criminals strike through virus attacks, destroy systems, modify and steal data from your system without your knowledge. The first and foremost job as an information security expert is to detect and analyze the vulnerabilities and then plug the loopholes to protect the system, network and data. Cyber security experts need to know about coding of some basic languages and database handling skills.”

Career ahead
If you are a trained professional in this field, you can find placement as network security systems manager, network security administrator, network security engineer, web security administrator, web security auditor, application security tester, ethical hacker, information security analyst, database and software developer, data security specialist, and chief information security officer.
An information security specialist can also start his own venture to provide security solutions to a variety of companies and government departments. Cyber security experts are a desired lot in banks, energy sector, hotels, airlines, healthcare, telecom companies, infrastructure, transportation, law enforcement, defence, emergency response systems and ITES companies, among others.

Required certifications
Graduates with a degree in computer science or engineering can opt for various full-time and short-term courses in information security, like MTech and MSc in Information Security, degree and diplomas in information security and network administration. You need to be trained and certified from a reputed organisation. International certifications like Certified Ethical Hacker (EC-Council) and GPEN can do wonders to one’s career as a cyber security expert. Salaries in this field range from `3 to 5 lakh per annum. With experience and desired expertise, the package may go up to 10-12 lakh per annum, and even to a crore.
(Cyberfort Technologies, a venture by IIT alumni, is a leading IT security consultancy and training firm in this arena.)

In a world increasingly defined and re-defined by the forces of the 21st century, all domains of human transactions have undergone massive change. Globalisation has made it mandatory to treat the world as one giant market for each and every product, service or process. Hence, no matter what the domain is, it is inevitable to consider its prospects and ramifications worldwide. Today, the chosen area of one’s endeavour is limited only by his/her imagination, otherwise all the world is a stage. Therefore, it has also become mandatory to restructure our systems and processes because for a global market, a system that stands the test at the global level is required. These are global challenges and global opportunities for what one has to offer to the 21st century world. In this context of ceaseless transformation in every sphere, education has no luxury to be a glorious exception. Across the world, it is pertinent to note that education is also measured against global benchmarks and international parameters. University rankings are the testimony of this globalized benchmarking of higher education. At such a time, when higher education is also undergoing a paradigm shift in terms of its foundational concepts, practices and benchmarks, it would be ideal to revisit higher education in India and discourse on its relevance to the globalized nature of the 21st century Indian scenario.

Across the world, higher education is deemed equivalent to opportunities for the youth to explore and widen the horizons of knowledge and seek the fulfillment of their aspirations. For a country like India that is deemed the youngest country in the world, it is easy to relate the development of the country to its youth and their development to higher education. In such an equation, it is advisable to ensure that the youth get the higher education of the international standards because they will be required to compete and perform at the international level. Unfortunately, it seems that there is a long way to go before we equip our youth through higher education for such international competition because our universities have not figured very high in the University Rankings and the employability ratio of the oft-quoted World Bank figure of 10% for general graduates does not seem to be going away too soon. If higher education is the system to provide the youth the opportunity for the development of their skills and competencies so that they realize their full potential and fulfill their aspirations, we are yet to see that happen for scores of youth who seek these employability skills and await simple straight forward employment opportunities. It has been stressed in various researches and reports on education that the aspects of experiential learning, application- based education and training of the youth to address the market needs are invaluable for the relevance of a country’s education and disregard for all this will invariably lead to erosion of the significance of education system itself. Hence, higher education is required to take cognizance of the fact that the world expects it to provide youth for its varied business and market needs and the responsibility of training them for that cannot be any longer avoided or postponed. Increasingly, higher education and employability are being related with each other and rigorously discoursed on different government and industry forums. Universities have enjoyed and continue to enjoy certain intellectual freedom that no organization in any domain does because everything is tied today to impact, outcomes and results. But the scenario has undergone a thorough change since the governments, industry bodies, companies and people at large have begun to link higher education to employability and employment and we have come to a point of no-return. Therefore, higher education will need to strive to fulfill its mandate of providing trained and skilled workforce to the country. It is not exactly disadvantageous to higher education because it is in this way that the relevance of higher education will be enhanced and its significance will remain sacred and beyond question.
The reasons for strengthening the relevance of higher education in the 21st century are many. Firstly, the 21st century as a knowledge century needs a robust system of higher learning. Secondly, if higher education fails, everything else is likely to be adversely affected – the economy, business, industry, etc. Thirdly, it is for creating knowledge workers of the 21st century that we need to empower higher education with respect to its relevance and its contribution to the society and national development. This is not the conjecture derived out of idle thinking. It concerns what is at stake. It is aptly captured by Dr Ragunath A Mashelkar, “As I see it from my perch in India’s science and technology leadership, if India plays its cards right, it can become by 2020 the world’s number-one knowledge production center, creating not only valuable private goods but also much needed public goods that will help the growing global population suffer less and live better.”
In India’s growth story, becoming ‘world’s number one knowledge production center’ is not optional. It is mandatory to accomplish it because unless there is knowledge production to suit the 21st century needs, India will never become an economic superpower. Increasingly, economic growth is directly being linked with what kind of education is provided to its youth. It is unequivocally clear that higher education is particularly entrusted with this responsibility of ‘knowledge production’, that Dr Mashelkar refers to, that is beneficial to the country and to the world. For such knowledge production and knowledge application, the youth need to be trained for a different skills set. The novel modes of teaching have to come into play and ICT has to be integrated to hone the skills of this high-tech generation for the kind of world they are likely to deal with as professional is quite different from the precepts taught at university departments. Connecting these dots in higher education is required to be done on priority basis so that we can see the full picture and act accordingly. Thus far, we have operated from an ivory tower but now that is a luxury we cannot afford because we have a large youth population to answer to and stakeholders in the world business and industry to provide skilled workforce for. Economics and Education have never been such close allies in national development. But the time is ripe for such a collaboration of mutual interest. Universities will enrich themselves further if they take a cue from market needs and offer courses and train students for skills and competencies that cater to specific industry and market situations. For an economy like ours which rests heavily on the Services sector, it would be ideal to have some skills development provision for the youth for that specific sector so that when they enter it, they excel at it. In all, the question of relevance of higher education is linked with questions of skilled workforce and economic development. If we, the policymakers, administrators and academicians, answer the question well, it will be our genuinely enduring contribution to nation building and, as for the question of the relevance of higher education, it will cease to exist.