Indian Education System

[Stan_Savljevic]

You said:

But successive govts, starting with NDA with MMJ, have found it politically expedient to rake up controversies around them...

The above means everything was fine and dandy till MMJ came to the scene, esp on the autonomy issue. Reality has been different and I just went to show how every politician has been a choothiya in his or her own right. Unfortunately, that means it hits at INC bozos and all the jokers of the pack that ran with the various Janata ** parties of the 70s and the leftist idiots.

What you said is nt what I said. In my field, we have the ribald example that acts as a toy problem: a drunken monkey throwing random keystrokes on an old Remington. Even the intersection of that event with what I said will have a positive probability of occurrence, definitely not what you said. And, I survived IITM, which obviously means I did nt learn grace to be showed at yakkitak fartboxes. At home, they taught me to throw back crap at crap, been doing that on this forum since 2006.

[somnath]

The above means everything was fine and dandy till MMJ came to the scene, esp on the autonomy issue

Not at all, obviously English is a problem with you...What I said was that there has been traditionally considerable autonomy with the IIXs, esp compared to he rest of the Indian academia..But the period from MMJ's time has been a complete waste in terms of policy, thanks to one controversy over another, which has precluded any substantive movement forward..

There is actually a lot to discuss around this issue (and as someone who recruits from both IITs and IIMs regularly, I know a few things about how things are shaping up), but you are not interested in that - you are merely interested in point scoring tinged with invectives...Thats your style I guess..Often wondered whether rudeness is a genetic construct or an (ignorance-influenced)-acquired one, maybe its a mix of both...

At home, they taught me to throw back crap at crap, been doing that on this forum since 2006

Carry on! Cant change your gene pool!

[Arjun]

But successive govts, starting with NDA with MMJ, have found it politically expedient to rake up controversies around them...Kapil Sibal has the right ideas, and seems to be moving in the right direction...

What controversy on IIT autonomy created by Joshi are you referring to? The issue of IIT fees ?

If the only thing world class about the IITs is their students - why is Sibal keen on changing the entrance system ? Is that what you mean by moving in the right direction?

[somnath]

What controversy on IIT autonomy created by Joshi are you referring to? The issue of IIT fees

Not just fees..MMJ tried to subvert the entire autonomy that exists in the IIXs - from appointments to constitution of their governing bodies to tryig to dictate curriculum...Something that Arjun Singh picked up dutifully later..At a time when the institutions were perfectly positioned to take the next step, 10-12 years were lost to these shenanigans...

If the only thing world class about the IITs is their students - why is Sibal keen on changing the entrance system ? Is that what you mean by moving in the right direction

One, the changes are not just KApil Sibal's idea..A lot of profs, including ex-Diros, have asked for that (including Prof Indiresan)...If/when it happens, it anyway wont be Kapil S's own unilateral decision - the IITs would need to buy-in..And dont see how a different evaluation system can dilute quality...

The point is that JR's comments on research output is something that is neither new nor novel - tons of people have said that...I read an interview recently of Prof Shekhar Choudhury (Diro, IIM-C) - he was asked the same question, and he admitted that and said that traditionally the mandate before the IIXs was to be excellent teaching instituions..Its only now that the mandate of researhc is being loked into afresh...the way science administration developed in India post independence (we had a bit of that discussion in the nuke thread) meant that bulk of public investments went into new govt monoliths like CSIR/DRDO..therefore, to start with, there wasnt even enough money being spent on research in the universities...That created its own vicious spiral...

Things are changing now, and KS has the right ideas...But as the recent Krishnamurthy committee report on IIM reforms showed, its mighty tough as it is...To have controversies as we had in the last 10-15 years means that the substantive discource is derailed...

[Bade]

What I find difficult to fathom is why are the successful and loud IIT/IIM alums not willing to start their own private MIT/Stanford/Harvard equivalent and leave the IITs alone. Why are they still trying to assign roles to themselves to be IIT change masters, based on just being Alums.

I am sure if they have become what they are today, because of what they are made of and not due to GoI dole in the past and the quality of IIT faculty and infrastructure, why bother to use the crutches of IITs to be pathfinders. I could never get a clear answer. A greenfield project without all the IIT baggage ( I personally do not think it is so bad) would be a good start to show the mettle of the IIT Alums. Why go back to momma and keep whining.

[Theo_Fidel]

I don't know about others but SathyaBama near Chennai is a relatively better functioning university. Yes, it started of as cheapo concrete boxes and pitiful staff but they are much much better now atleast at the core item of teaching their students. In fact, with rare exceptions, most of the TN universities are way better than they used to be. Last year I visited my cousins daughter at Karunya University (never heard of it right) near Coimbatore and the campus was unbelievable. Immaculate grass/buildings/trees/roads. Can't vouch for their staff but she was very happy with the level of study and she was State 2nd rank in Maths in Standard 10. I wish these Universities had been around when I went to school. It was pretty much Anna University or bust for us. The IIT crowd did not mix with us State syllabus types. Still doesn't from what I hear.

From my point of view IIT get no respect from me till they win some noble prizes for Desh. Else they too be pencil pushers, very good pencil pushers mind you. We've had IIT's for a long time, but we only took off economically once private universities opened up and a technical education was opened up to most people.

Most government colleges, including Anna university where I went have staff who are there for the life long security and stability. To them the big time salary is big time risk. The fact that some of them enjoy/love teaching/research is merely a side effect.

You can see it in the fact that teachers who taught me 30 years ago are still all there. No one leaves. I suspect that is true of IIT's as well. The faculty has been expanded a bit but that is only because of much larger classes. One of the professors I knew is a probably the best piano player I've ever heard. True prodigy. Level 12 by age 13, if you know anything about piano playing, you know how staggering this is. Yet there he is teaching computer science at Anna University. Not necessarily his first choice. Still plays the piano and gives occasional concerts.

In most American universities, if you don't have tenure, you will wash out fairly quickly and another batch will take your place.

[negi]

From my point of view IIT get no respect from me till they win some noble prizes for Desh. Else they too be pencil pushers, very good pencil pushers mind you. We've had IIT's for a long time, but we only took off economically once private universities opened up and a technical education was opened up to most people.

Boss I hope above is a tongue in cheek remark for I find above logic highly flawed. Noble is just a 'recognition' of one's contributions nothing more nothing less and for an argument's sake if that is how you want to measure the success of an institution why not go by number of S. S Bhatnagar awards won by the IIT alums ? Why shouldn't one take into consideration the number of IIT alums doing research in ISRO, DRDO and even the CSIR labs. I can understand the argument about not being in awe of an 'institute' per se, hey but there is no reason to pull it down either.

[chaanakya]

. We've had IIT's for a long time, but we only took off economically once private universities opened up and a technical education was opened up to most people.

IITs mostly catered to USA's middle and low level requirement of well trained manpower.

IT revolutions and all that is legend is due to policy change by Rajiv Gandhi, for all his faults, he was genuine.

[vera_k]

IMO the IIX need to define their mission clearly between between being institutions that produce large amounts of BS/MS level trained people (current system) or as research universities.

In this the need of the day is to be a research university, because there are plenty of private alternatives available to get the BS/MS level of training these days. To compensate students for change in focus from the BS/MS program, the government can offer a large number of scholarship vouchers to candidates who qualify through the JEE, such that students can study in a institution of their choice.

[Theo_Fidel]

negi,

This can easily become a flame war so my last comment on this.

Nothing tongue in cheek at all. The question is what has IIT achieved not what its Alumni, brilliant people most of them, have achieved after graduation. Truth is those people would have succeeded in any environment, as most have gone on to prove.

If I take Chennai, IIT Chennai could disappear tomorrow and educationally the city of Chennai would not even know it. Companies rarely recruit from there, some minor collaboration is ongoing but the other universities provide 50,000 engineers to chose from. Even Anna University is increasingly irrelevant. It could disappear tomorrow and the city would not notice. By choosing to remain elite without really doing anything, these institutions have made themselves increasingly irrelevant.

Say MIT went the next 50 years without a single Nobel prize to a faculty member, it too would be consigned to history.

WRT to ISRO I'd like to point out that the present Head is K. Radhakrishnana, proud Alumni of that great institution, Kerala University.
DG of CSIR Samir Brahamachari is proud Alumni of that much praised institute, Calcutta University. So it goes...
WRT to DRDO the less said the better.

[Raja Bose]

The question is what has IIT achieved not what its Alumni, brilliant people most of them, have achieved after graduation. Truth is those people would have succeeded in any environment, as most have gone on to prove.

Part of the reason like I said before, is lack of quantity. A few superstars (and most IITians are smart but not superstars either) cannot make a huge impact. In the end major impact is achieved through a large number of highly trained and talented but non-superstar folks actually putting in the hours and sweat to make something happen. If all massa had was MIT and Stanford, you wouldn't be seeing them get any Nobel Prizes either. If all AAPL had was Steve Jobs, you wouldn't be seeing no iPod/iPhone/iPad either. In these cases the giants stand on the shoulder of mortals, not the other way round - this is a paraphrasing of a statement made to me 7 years back by a Fields Medalist no less.

Also, I see regularly the argument advanced by folks even today (esp. of my father's IIT generation) that "Look! How great we did in massa/oirope/oz/timbuktu! That was due to our IIT training!". I agree with the former part but not with the latter statement.

It just so happened was that due to usual desi resource-crunch and lack of resources for all, in the early days (50s-early 80s) only the IIT students (being the best of the best) got the relevant exposure and guidance in large numbers to go abroad for engineering studies and coming from a tough Indian system, they naturally flourished. But it had nothing to do with them being trained in the IITs - if the same students had come from Anna U., they would have done just as well. And this is evident now, when having an IIT education is not necessary for going to a good university in US and that is why you see folks from Anna U./Jadavpur U./RECs doing equally good as the IITians in both industry and academia.

Now that brings me to the point I want to make, which is, are the "success stories" that are bandied about really the pinnacle of achievement that can be expected from the best of the best? NO! They have been successful no doubt but that level of success has very little to do which the special/harsh training that the IIT institution is known for and claims to exclusively provide. Hence, clearly something is missing in the mix which is not harnessing the capabilities for which the students who make it to IIT are chosen for - clearly those capabilities is not fully utilized for just writing code or doing some tel-maalish in iBanking.

Based on my observations in IITK and D, it is partly to do with faculty/admin attitude and partly to do with student attitude. IITK for example, I remember has a pretty decent equipment for doing certain fizzyics research yet when I asked one of the senior profs. how many undergrads were given the chance to use the equipment or how many undergrads were courted to do research, the answer was "0"! His reply was "They all anyways come to get the IIT stamp and go on to become bankers, so whats the use?". So it is not just some question of autonomy or money but basic attitudes prevailing are also a factor. And why blame the attitude when the smart yet impressionable 18 year olds see research as the equivalent to taking a vow of poverty in our country. And where will research work assignments come from, when our industries are happy taking phone calls from dumb goras and rubber stamping cheap Chinese crap with their stickers, instead of setting up their own R&D, and product lines and our military has a Natasha-fixation?

Re. Samir Brahmachary - less said about him the better

[Bade]

All the greats of science and Engg in the era before IITs were successful with less training and not filtered cutoffs to select genius. So there is ample proof right from India itself that filtering alone has never provided jewels, even when the supply was rather short. I do agree with Theo, that the best of the students would always be the best irrespective of the univ/college they went to. The Univ/Inst just provides an avenue to make better use of resources to go to the next level. But somehow we are fixated on selection alone as providing and ensuring quality of output.

[chaanakya]

IMO the IIX need to define their mission clearly between between being institutions that produce large amounts of BS/MS level trained people (current system) or as research universities.

In this the need of the day is to be a research university, because there are plenty of private alternatives available to get the BS/MS level of training these days. To compensate students for change in focus from the BS/MS program, the government can offer a large number of scholarship vouchers to candidates who qualify through the JEE, such that students can study in a institution of their choice.

IITs always had primary mandate of UG teaching. Research was secondary.That is still the case.

For research etc institutions were like IISc which were into research and post graduate studies.

Because of excellent infrastructures created to make it world class and assured funding with world class faculty ( notwithstanding what JR says), ITTs easily conducted research in many areas. But because of its UG character , that limitations showed. Can't blame IITs. RECs, now rechristened NITs , had the mandate to showcase how a good engineering colleges should look like , primarily to inspire states to go for those standards.

However individual brilliance and geniuses are not restricted to any specific institutions.

[Bade]

So the question remains if NITs or RECs were supposed to be model engg colleges, why did they have to setup IITs just for UG teaching.

[chaanakya]

So the question remains if NITs or RECs were supposed to be model engg colleges,
RECs were Models for states to set up colleges with limited resources as IITs are resource guzzler being in the league of World class infrastructure.

RB has correctly said

In the end major impact is achieved through a large number of highly trained and talented but non-superstar folks actually putting in the hours and sweat to make something happen.

why did they have to setup IITs just for UG teaching.

To see what world class institutions looked like. I understand that idea was to model it on MIT . How far it succeeded is another story.

[Bade]

But MIT was not a teaching alone focused UG institute.

1) So IITs under sell their mission when questioned too deeply on research accomplishments and point to their stellar alumni as evidence for quality UG factory.

2) Stellar Alumni point to faculty and say we are good just because of JEE and not good faculty.

3) The natural logical step would be have JEE and print UG certificates based on admission criteria alone, why waste on infrastructure spending when input quality is guaranteed for success due to superior selection method alone.

[Stan_Savljevic]

Raja, what is the fraction of UGs in massa or elsewhere who end up doing research? I can give a pointer based on what I have seen of UGs in different countries: UGs on average have other interests than getting their hands dirty on research. Just because 1 or 2 here and there are keen does nt mean that the whole lot is begging to do research and get to like it. Do IITs fail to harness the interests of interested UGs in the direction of research? Well, if it is my answer, it is a big NO. If you are keen and self-motivated, there are a 100 gazillion ways to exploit the resources at IITs. The big catch is "if you are keen and self-motivated to go hunt for things." Obviously, if you are lazy and comfortable playing bridge in the hostel zone day-in day-out and thulping from the mega mess or giga mess on-time everytime, life leaves you by and all you have is 4-5 years of what was that great-IIT education which taught you everything but some book knowledge and how to get more. Do all who have enthu get exactly what was their first priority? Obviously, no. In a place like India, it is easy to find that next person who is a little better than you at that point in time and space. Do their trajectories continue on that path? Not always. But does the non-attainability of first choice hobble people for eternity? Depends on the person.

I know about UG research because I did and I have seen nuff people who did. I was not even in the top 10% of the class, but I was probably one of the few who went after it, so I got it. Not all of those few do research now though, thats a different point. The fact remains that those who end up still doing research 20-30 years after their PhD dont get driven by the fact that they have an IIT education. In elementary physics modeling linear dynamics, it is s = ut + 1/2 at^2, u is what IIT gives you, a is what you have. Obviously, over a long period of interest, self-motivation trumps where you come from, but given two people with the same level of self-motivation where you start from makes a big difference. Given all the cussing at IITs, I am pretty sure that if we re-started all the cussers' life at time = 0, and gave them a choice of IIT or no-IIT, they will with a high probability choose IIT. That is an undeniable fact of life. Unfortunate is the circling around in a dervish motion about that fact.

Bade, why dont the IITians start their own greenfield project? A couple are in the works, but obviously such projects need money. Shitloads of money. And not all IITians with money think differently like that. Do educated people start private colleges in India? Take the case of TN. 90-95% of the people starting new engg colleges are politicians or benamis of ex-politicians or people with such type of clout with a desperate need to park their cash in an area other than Kollywood or real estate. How many Anna University alums have started greenfield projects, how many from Jadavpur, how many from Delhi University? Cmon. Many make alum contributions to IITs and their alma maters in US. Not everyone does, but quite a few do it today somuch that there is a corpus for funding graduate students to present papers in massa and oirope. It is a corpus that is not shallow from all indication, it is decently deep to permit a couple of trips per year per person to international conferences. That is two conferences more than what we used to have in our day.

It is a convenient ruse to ask IITs to stop getting their freeloading from MHRD. Noone is denying that the IITs have got their fair share and more from GoI. Noone is saying that IITs are standing on their own feet independently. That is just twisting logic to fit your worldview, Bade. Fact is, IITs are not world class, lying that they are is just that, lying. But once someone starts digging at why they aint world class, obviously some fraction of the blame should go to the policy making sphere, a ka GoI and MHRD. It is an undeniable fact that the Congress regime came with the idea of instis of national importance. It is also the same regime that has been hobbling these instis with arcane rules and regulations meant for the 60s. Let me give you a personal anecdote. I happened to nominate some great alum in massa for DAA this year. Got rejected, because they cant give it to more than one academic from the same department this year not to mention that both are greats. These are the same arcane rules that govern either Arjuna awards or Padma Bhushans. How many educators has the GoI awarded last year or the year before? Even Kareena Kapoor gets one. When the big guy in the house sets such stupid precedents wherein he does nt set a high priority for edu activities, how does it expect chotta motas from not following exactly his pattern?

So when one guffaws at creating something great such as IITs and IIMs, one should take = responsibility for fcking it by being convenient assholes too. Putting the blame on Murli Manohar Joshi (notwithstanding the fact that MMJ was a joker non-pareil) is like trying to hide the full pumpkin in rice. This is the BS that gets peddled by folks such as Somnath. There is a good reason why he sounds like a spoon, and a broken spoon at that. Take your share of blame, dont run around in circles and blame it 100% of the not-so-world class faculty. Like what Jairam Ramesh did. A not-so-world class faculty cant publish as often as they do nor can they teach effectively, hardly a fact given the different citation metrics that are available for free viewing. IITs dont do as well as they can, but nor does IISc or as a matter of fact any other insti or university. If every place is as fcked as the IITs are, it only points to fcking up at the one place that is common to all of them: UGC and through that to MHRD and GoI. Jairam Ramesh or his uncle cant deny that they been a part of the govt for 90% of free India's ruling clique. So let em take the brickbats too instead of shoving it on jokers such as MMJ and the not-so-world class faculty alone.

[Bade]

Stan, long post as usual from you

Good to know that IIT Alums are engaged in creating greenfield institutes. That is indeed something I would look forward to. Had not heard about this before. There are plenty of money bags among the Alums, and if not why not engage the industry houses to setup one. Bhabha did exactly that to get TIFR going from the Tata family, and Sarabhai dipped into his own pockets to jump start PRL. If they could do it in 1950s India, successfull Alums from the IITs have less of an excuse, some even are VC level at universities and have the expertise to help and prosper.

[Raja Bose]

Stan, In your post the research you are talking about is, doing basic research and research which is done in academic environs where main drivers are intellectual curiosity and gratification. What I am talking about is applied research and research which has monetary rewards tied to end-results and impact (this is not IISc/TIFR territory) - mainly industrial research and in a little way, startup territory. I am not discounting the intellectual curiosity/gratification part becoz that is what drives creativity and innovation but in today's world that is no longer enough for most people (including me). Re. your question as to how many UGs in massa do research?: basic research - very few, applied research - quite a lot - I was very actively involved in working with UGs on pervasive computing research for a number of years. A lot of them have gone on to do pretty good work in private industry and govt. labs (some don't even have MS degrees, leave alone a pee-chaddi). And the idea is not to make UGs just do research and jump up to become researchers but rather get the more promising amongst them to wet their feet and prepare them for doing research (while pursuing MS or pee-chaddi) within IIT as their 1st choice, instead of flying offshore to do the same. As Indian premier engineering university, IIT is the best positioned to do that. But for that to happen, a lot of support and impetus from Indian industry is required becoz they provide the "need" and the "rewards" aspect of this equation. In the end, even if 10% of such efforts result in good outcomes, the impact is phenomenal.

Re. whether one would choose IIT or not given a chance to turn the clock back to 0, I think you are being presumptuous in assuming everybody wants to get into IIT real bad and moreover, still wants to get in after realizing what it gets them or doesn't. Interestingly, my father (who went to IITK from '66-'71 and fondly talks about his time there) made a comment recently along the lines that not going to IIT didn't affect where I finally ended up - my answer was that, looking at all my friends who went the IIT route, if I had gone thru a IIT (CS/EE), I wouldn't be doing what I am doing and instead I would be stuck somewhere I wouldn't want to be in. So as non-intuitive as it may sound, for some of us, an IIT education would be a mistake not a blessing.

[Stan_Savljevic]

And the idea is not to make UGs just do research and jump up to become researchers but rather get the more promising amongst them to wet their feet and prepare them for doing research (while pursuing MS or pee-chaddi) within IIT as their 1st choice, instead of flying offshore to do the same.

If lotsa folks want to stay back and do MS/PhD in India, a good fraction of the good Indians elsewhere have to return back. For that, amrika will have to go down to where its punching weight really should be. And needless to say, all these 6th Pay Commission pay slabs have to go and the GoI has to let the administrators decide what to pay whom based on how they decide it. In short, the IIT Act needs an amendment and in return for that amendment, the GoI needs a guarantee from the IIT administrators that they wont suck up a vast fraction of MHRD funds. For this, alternate sources of funding mechanisms have to be found, which means increase of tuition fees + low interest rate loans to students to pay their tuitions. The model as is is not sustainable to infinity and GoI/IIT administrators have to realize that. IIT admins do as is seen from the Vision statements that float around quite often (like the Kakodkar committee report), but for GoI, IITs are a golden goose which they as jagirdars can bestow to a state that kowtows to them or in some settings, which state whines the best.

All this means GoI has to make up its mind that all the institutions of national importance it started will go on their own to their natural state of shittiness aka equilibrium point. For a GoI that loves to control life of everyone around it in different forms, thats a big leap in terms of reality. Earlier it used to be the license mafia, now the jagirdari and emoluments are in terms of awards and slabs that people can play with. But to help, amrika will go down cos that is just normal. Already, the acad job market is fanciful nuff given that the retards already in wont kick the bucket not anytime soon. Will India rise up to punch on its own and according to its own weight, we will have to wait and see.

The waiting and seeing aside, all I can say is, everything is evolving according to a plan put up in the early 19th century by the Illuminati and fricking Jews, you see. Its been gamed and socio-phenomenological studies have been done, some of which have been posted on scribd. Take some popcorn and watch the show.

[somnath]

Stan, In your post the research you are talking about is, doing basic research and research which is done in academic environs where main drivers are intellectual curiosity and gratification. What I am talking about is applied research and research which has monetary rewards tied to end-results and impact (this is not IISc/TIFR territory) - mainly industrial research and in a little way, startup territory. I am not discounting the intellectual curiosity/gratification part becoz that is what drives creativity and innovation but in today's world that is no longer enough for most people (including me).

Absolutely, people who talk of "research for the love of it" or academics for the love of it are living in a cuckooland, or else preaching about one that doesnt exist...A vast majority of prima donnas in the western academia would simply have done something else if the monetary rewards werent enough..I dont suppose too many among the late Sumantra Ghoshal or CK Prahlad or for that matter "young turks" like Krishna Palepu or Mohanbir Sawhney would have ventured into the academia if they didnt see the potential of filing million dollar tax returns...

Wherein lies the gist of the "world class" debate..

There are various elements to a university.
1. Students
2. Physical infra
3. Faculty
4. conceptual orientation

First isnt the issue..Physical infra, while its not as good as the US unis, by all accounts (classroom, IT, teacher-student ratios, heck even airconditioning!) the IIXs have been light years ahead of any other uni..More than a decade back, we had all dorms wired up for individual internet/intranet connectivity - this during days when a 56 kbps dial-up line was a luxury....

Faculty is an interesting issue..The current crop can be hardly described as "inferior" in "quality"...Non-PhDs are less-than-rare, and the entire faculty is made up of alumni from the IIXs themselves and HArvard/Yale/Berkeley...The big issue is scaling up...with OBC quota forcing increased capacity, all of them are strggling to recruit faculty of the same quality..Why? Ask any Director - its a salary issue...

It is really the last point that defines tha lack of "world class"-ness of the IIXs..As Shekhar Chaudhury mentioend, researhc was not the mandate - the mandate was teaching..And the IIXs, quibbles aside, have developed into great teaching instittuions...As Prof Anil Sadagopal (if I am not mistaken) said once - if all that was required was the JEE/CAT score to recruit students, why dont corporates simply take the lists and recruit? Why recruit rom the ranks of s
uccessful passouts? As someone who recruits regularly, I dont deny this...the quality of teaching has gotten better, at least from the time I graduated to now...The multidisciplinary approach has gotten more embedded..Where there is an issue is really on certain evolving areas..For example, there is a need for more Keynesian economists, given the meltdown and the reaction to it...That breed is as it is rare, and it is well nigh impossible to get them from the US at Indian salaries - we are back to salaries again!

Which leaves the issue of research..As said before, one it wasnt the mandate..And two, the science administration from the '50s veered towards fudning govt monoliths like CSIR/DRDO, not unis...As a result, there was no funding for the IIXs either...So a vicious cycle emerged - no funding, therfroe no research, therefore studets keen on that would either migrate to thenUS or migrate to banking! Things started chaging, slowly, but surely with the onset of reforms...some of it ovt sector led - Infosys started a 25k/month fellowship for people doing doctoral studies in IS - back in 1997-98-99 this was a fairly handsome amount indeed...there was opporunity to sclae it up, and had to be largely state led...Unfortunately, that forward movement never happened, wherein the govt started using IIXs for greater amount of public R&D...Then the last 12-13 years were just lost in controversies...

SO the issues are well known - in order to attract better faculty, there is need for autnomy to fix salaries...And in order to have more reearch out put, we need better funding..Both need sustained efforts..Bulk of the baisc autnomy on curiculum, is already in place...Bemoaning about IIT Act, JLN, lack of student aptitude et al are just fudge - once funding and (some elements of, primarily compensation) autonomy are fixed, things will start falling into place..

[vina]

Whether they are/were IIT alums is immaterial. The moment these folks become politicians, the argee gene evolves into a choothiya gene. Or rather the choothiya gene which was always there gets to be used in something other than streetsmarts like, for example, making money and becoming an elite with a rape attitude. The more power vested in them as Ministers and jagirdars, the more they feel manly and ballsy. The same applies to one Murli Manohar Joshi and his uncle

Yes indeed. The amount of wannabe ArrGee that monkeys outside want to do to the good madrassas is unimaginable. JR atleast made some sense by talking about the faculty and all the challenges and how they are not geared towards research .. true, but that is the nature of the beast in India, the teaching vs research institute in India split (CSIR etc) is a fundamental problem , and of course the babu and politico monkeys mucking around and doing "command and control" is another. IN fact, I couldn't believe that MMJ and his hare brained "Guru Dakshina" businesess.. Hello, Gururaj Deshpande, took the $XX millions he was giving to IIT-M (his alma mater) and that research center and took it to MIT where they accepted it with open arms. Thank you MMJ! And now, JR will go on and on about how the IITs dont arent research focused. Why MMJ had huge takleef for Nandan Nilekani giving money for hostels at IIT Bombay.

Yeah. MMJ/Politico monkeys and other assorted scoundrels would like to take the endownments and grants/contributiosn whatever from the IITs and spend it on "Guru Dakshina" , on JNU and St Stephens e-Con, Allahabad Univ and other such places that basically creates nothing but parasites with a huge sense of entitlement that feeds off others and produces nothing but CPI-M ideologues/naxalites and "posh" wannabes in Inglees, Littrachaw and high falutin things that whine a lot , grab your money and curse you all the same and try to make you feel somehow guilty if you dont indulge their parasitical urges!

[vina]

What I find difficult to fathom is why are the successful and loud IIT/IIM alums not willing to start their own private MIT/Stanford/Harvard equivalent and leave the IITs alone. Why are they still trying to assign roles to themselves to be IIT change masters, based on just being Alums.

Bade. Fundamentally, private univs are not allowed in India and even if it does,there is huge govt monkeying via laws, admins, guidelines etc. etc.. So there you are. Ejjukashun despite all the Kapil Sibal esque protestatiosn is a stalinist command and control enterprise in India. That is why no Al-Haahvud, Stan madrassa, You Penn, Pwinceton, Corrumpia. etc in INdia. It cannot come up. The ones that came up( eg BITS) predated the stalinism madness.

A greenfield project without all the IIT baggage ( I personally do not think it is so bad) would be a good start to show the mettle of the IIT Alums. Why go back to momma and keep whining.

See para above.

[Bade]

If the idea is to just focus on teaching at the IITs (I am leaving out IIM as it is a different kind of beast) there is need for some infra but does not have to be really top class in-house just for doing UG research. A lot could be done with collaboration with national labs, if the money for world class level is already plunked down there and duplication is not required. But such collaboration has not happened it seems or is limited at the UG level. The Autonomy issue is then needed to fix salary scales independently and in faculty hiring, if IITs want to remain UG/PG teaching focused institutes only. The big role of Admin block etc comes with big research money and associated lab property that is required.

Here is an interesting statistics on use R&D spend at the Universities. In absolute terms lot of yearly R&D spend is within certain core industries at ~ $289 billion (Yr 2008) by businesses alone and the total including federal spending equals $397 billion. But most of the business sponsored R&D is spent not in Univ Labs.

Universities and colleges are estimated to have performed more than half (56%) of the nation's basic research in 2008. (See "R&D by Character of Work.") They also rely much more than the business sector on external R&D funding. In 2008, about 27% of academic R&D was funded by the institutions themselves; 59% was funded by the federal government; and the balance was funded by state and local governments, nonprofits and other types of organizations, and private gifts

That is what I thought too and the Autonomy issue is not going to make a big dent for IITs to attract business R&D spend when it seems it is so low even in the US with their Univs having better infra and talent base.

[Stan_Savljevic]

Bade, autonomy is not in terms of R&D grants. In India, we have a few competitive bodies like DAE, CSIR, ICAR, DRDO etc. from which people fight out for grants just as in the US, we have NSF, NIH, ARL, ONR, etc. These bodies fund quite a bit, almost all I should say. I am not sure if you have seen this: http://nopr.niscair.res.in/bitstream/12 ... 80-787.pdf . If a project is competitive, it should get a grant approval and let all instis fight it out on merit modulo the bullshit that gets passed on for grant committee nexus that is par for the course everywhere, amrika, old oirope, white paki land, etc.

The issue that get missed out is that R&D expenditure is not the biggest sink of expenses at IITs. It is the teaching part which MHRD outlays and baksheesh-es. With increased intake, GoI baksheesh-es less per student, but this is still a high number on an absolute scale. The decrease in funds per student with increased intake means poor quality of materials for a new and coming student. Now ideally given the burgeoning middle class, one would have expected IITs to go with the IIM model and start having low interest, long-term loan plans + self-payment by students on par with what they get. But that is clearly anathema to MHRD because it goes against the grain of the socialist dogma that still thrives at the upper echelons of policymaking in India. What is worse, once students start paying up, the drift will be market driven and some places like AP which produce a lot of students will start demanding a couple of IITs in the state. Where will GoI end up then if it cant act as the uber-subedar of taxing and re-allocating India's tax moneys? Slowly, this will set a precedent wherein people will start asking for accountability in everything including idiots such as NREGA, all those Indira awas, Jawahar Rozgar rubbish. That is the catch, once you loosen at one place, it will come back to bite you at every place. This is what MHRD and Cabinet Committee fears.

While we can talk to eternity about IIT fac pay, thats not the central issue. That is definitely a issue in hiring and ideally we need a P&T policy too. But these are issues that need to be addressed when the mega issue of student pay for education is solved reasonably. This issue wont be solved because the uber-subedar will feel less manly. Ask this same Jairam Ramesh to see which way he voted on the Kakodkar committee report, I really want to know what he has to say on this issue, not his pronouncements on whether there are world class fac or not.

[Bade]

Yes, the Kakodkar committee report I read in the media will raise fees 10+ fold or so, provided student loans are guaranteed that should be ok. But then pay not just for IIT faculty but all other downstream GoI institutions will have to go up to make it viable. Or else that will be good bye to IIT students joining ISRO/DRDO etc. in future, probably even far less probability than what it is now.

A two tier approach like in massa will have to be the end goal. The rich private schools ala Harvard/Stanford etc for the rich and smart and a few meritorious ones on scholarship and equally good public univs like the UC system and other state univs which provide a more subsidized education but maintain quality. The bigger challenge for India is to provide the latter.

Both approaches have their merits and pitfalls.

[vina]

But then pay not just for IIT faculty but all other downstream GoI institutions will have to go up to make it viable. Or else that will be good bye to IIT students joining ISRO/DRDO etc. in future, probably even far less probability than what it is now.

This is something I could never understand in all these years. WTF should anyone go and work for GOI or anyone at sub par /below fair whatever wages (a throw back to the shortage, subsidy, rationing, model) and then to sustain such a model you do very stupid things and have the attendent problems.

We should have a clean break with that kind of rubbish. Where the GOI is competing with the market, you should have market based pay scales. A one size fits all pay and stuff makes no sense whatsoever! Kick the babus in the nuts and put them out to pasture and pay them the pittance you want. But why make ISRO/DRDO/BEL/BHEL/any other engg focused company/ be beholden to what an IAS monkey makes or does not make (fogged about under the table) and the ridiculous law (that got repealed thankfully in the first flush of reforms) that capped the highest pay in India to the president of india!

Time to decouple these from the general GOI jarnail/karnail equivalence and pay and perks whatever and let them go their own ways. For the babu parasites , and JNU types, you pay them nothing, fine, but why others.

Case in point the ridiculousness of it all. After R2I ing, I saw an article that the govt raised the faculty retirement age to 62 @ the madrassas and immediately the "staff" picked up the lal jhanda to have their retirment ages raised too!

[vina]

If the idea is to just focus on teaching at the IITs (I am leaving out IIM as it is a different kind of beast) there is need for some infra but does not have to be really top class in-house just for doing UG research. A lot could be done with collaboration with national labs,

In fact the fact that "national labs" are a separate island in India is part of the fundamental problem! That sepration should be done away with and the "national labs" should be merged into the appropriate dept at the nearest madrassa !

That is what I thought too and the Autonomy issue is not going to make a big dent for IITs to attract business R&D spend when it seems it is so low even in the US with their Univs having better infra and talent base.

The problem is that people expect research to cross subsidize teaching and UG population. That is the classic Indian "railway train" mentality. One of my uncles (a retd member of the railway board) put it to me. The 1st class and A/C subsidize the other classes and net-net the thing is revenue neutral! This is the thinking that is dripping from every sinew and marrow of the Indian babu class and is very "socialist" par excellence, with intellectual justifications such as "to each according to capacity" or more posh e-Con-o-comic justifications such as "progressive taxation" or YumBeeYea scoundrel giri of "Yield Management" (same thing in airlines, Phusth and PissNess subsdizes cattle class and earns the bulk of the profits.. well we saw where that model went with all the airline bankruptcies).

So the UG in most populist/politico thinking is like the 2nd class Indian Railway ticket where Bangalore Chennai @ 360Km is less than 150 Rs including everything (actual tick is around Rs 100 or so I think , havent taken the train lately). The "Research" is supposed to be the Phusht YeaCee /2nd YeaCee . So basically wont work. UGs must be made to pay the "economic fare" . It is not for nothing that even Al-Haahvud despite the endownment running mega billions (what is it now $15b?) still does not subsidize UG , but rather uses UG as a revenue stream to subsidize research and other stuff!

[Theo_Fidel]

Case in point the ridiculousness of it all. After R2I ing, I saw an article that the govt raised the faculty retirement age to 62 @ the madrassas and immediately the "staff" picked up the lal jhanda to have their retirment ages raised too!

Whyfor we have retirement age at all. Many scientist are productive till they die. If not they get turfed out double quick irrespective of age.

The truth is the faculty at our universities are not scientists, merely PSU type workers. At least that is the way they approach their work and the GOI treats them.

I support the idea that the JEE should turn into a scholarship vehicle. GOI then under writes the study and research of that student at any university. That should get the Jhanda flying.

[somnath]

Yes, the Kakodkar committee report I read in the media will raise fees 10+ fold or so, provided student loans are guaranteed that should be ok. But then pay not just for IIT faculty but all other downstream GoI institutions will have to go up to make it viable. Or else that will be good bye to IIT students joining ISRO/DRDO etc. in future, probably even far less probability than what it is now.

The fees are not a big deal at all...They have been raising fees almost right from the start of the reforms process...It was taken in everyne's stride till MMJ tried making an issue out of it...The IIM fees have gone up from virtualy nothing in 1990 to 12-13 lacs now...IIT fees have gone up int he same period to 50k/year...With student loans, grants and scholarships, its a manageable issue..Even if fees @ IIT are raised 5-7 times, there wont be a problem...

But currently, the issue with paying faculty is not immediately about funding...The older IIXs have corpuses that are pretty large - I was part of a couple of "counter initiatives" by alumni in MMJ's time, and I saw numbers like 150 crores for each..while its not a long term or ideal solution, if the IIXs wanted, they could double faculty salary in short time using some of the "yields" out of those corpuses..This, till student fees became operating expense sustaining ....the issue is of autonomy of setting salaries..Its an ironic situation - the IIXs have full autonomy to recruit (there are no UGC-type guidelines), but no autonomy to decide compensation..

About DRDO/ISRO, that is a bigger problem for the GOI to tackle...Its not as if there arent people joining them - Avinash Chander (head ASL- the most sensitive lab in DRDO) is from IIT-D...Dr Radhakrishnan of ISRO is from IIM-B..But without significantly better comp, its not going to happen...

[negi]

^ Well reforms cannot be done in isolation, that's why I agree with Stan's part about IITs being given the autonomy to the point that the varsity can take a call on the compensation of the faculty (no one knows better than them as to how much they have and can afford to sped for a given fiscal year).

Expecting that GoI would offer the IIT faculty anything over and above the 6th pay commission recomendations is unreasonable , reason being other institutions too would then ask for similar consideration. However if the GoI really wants it can indeed help by floating some scheme (ok if it helps, in the name of Gandhi onlee) where GoI will bear the travel expenses for international conferences in case a paper is selected by the committee.

[somnath]

^^^The big piece of "autonomy" that is missing really is the power to set compensation..Jut givign that freedom will change certain things radically, even without more sweeping reforms..

However if the GoI really wants it can indeed help by floating some scheme (ok if it helps, in the name of Gandhi onlee) where GoI will bear the travel expenses for international conferences in case a paper is selected by the committee

This is a bit of a red herring...Profs are going for international conferences all the time..At any given point, 10-15% of the faculty is abroad...Heck, in the IIMs half the students are on exchange programmes now...Even 3 years back, when I used to talk to a few profs often, this wasnt an issue..

[Bade]

I agree the folks with connections abroad always find the money. I know for sure this was true for Physics even 20 years ago. Short summer sabbatical was not uncommon. Even theorists did that. Low-temp Physics, High-Tc Superstars and thin-film guys which was the bread and butter of the dept all traveled with no issues.

[Bade]

One way to address travel for conference issues, is to have more of them with International participants in India regularly that students too can travel with minimal costs. Orgs like SPIE do that in applied sciences with help from local sponsors and the basic sciences types do not mind going to turd world countries as it becomes an exotic vacation too. So this way students can get more exposure to the outside world.

[sum]

^^ Unrelated to the fascinating exchanges on IIT etc going on, but what is this controversy over St.Stephens being a "communal" institution which was playing out on NDTV with INC ( not communal BJP) MP, Sandeep Dikshit almost coming to blows with St.Stephens principal, Fr. Valson Thampu?

MP Sandeep is arguing that St.Stephens is completely communal and even the faculty openings are being given only to Christians ( in students side,anyways 50% is reserved for Christians)!!

[Bade]

This is true for all x'tian colleges, and not limited to St Stephen's.

[sum]

^^ Hmmm...then there must be some other reason for this fight if the informal Christian quota for faculty thing is such a common occurrence in all X-tian colleges..

[chaanakya]

Valson is seen as usurper , not fit for Stephens

[Theo_Fidel]

This is true for all x'tian colleges, and not limited to St Stephen's.

Bade,

That is not true at all.

There are different Christian associations involved in different schools. Unfortunately some groups feel pressures from their funding sources that they succumb to.

[Bade]

This was true for the pre-UG college I attended a reputed one, and it was common knowledge that it was universally true for others too. I saw the same in hiring patterns of recent times that I get to hear from family.
What goes to the credit of these X'tian colleges is that even with this practice there seem to be no outright compromise made in the quality selected from the pool they receive applications from. There are enough X'tian candidates who would also merit a selection without the informal quota in place.