Bharat Rakshak

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 00:03**

1 in four IIT-B grads wants to be entrepreneur in 5 years: Survey
60% or more students stay put in India these days for good or bad...contrary to what is claimed usually. In the old days the numbers were less for sure.

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 01:16**

prasannasimha wrote:Theo fidel- it seems when I say something - it is random aspersions whereas when you say something - it is fact.I have given enough examples and you choose not to see it. When I give examples you say there are no proof and I don't think you understand what is meant by in the spirit of full disclosure - what was asked to be disclosed was if they (anyone discussing it) have financial interests. That means a Yes or No - no one is asking an IT return !!

I see you still refuse to explain why it is a ponzi scheme. Are you going to address it at some point or not.

No. I never cast aspersions. It is the person casting aspersion who has to back it up. The only people I have attacked are the babu's, a chunk of whom run the AICTE and that is based on their own comments posted here on this thread in a dozen or so posts on the subject. Just posting anecdotes and something you 'think' happens is not proof. If this is the level of proof required as a society we can not function...

So I went to the Vinayaka Medical college case and apparently a few of their faculty were found non-resident so the colleges are being told to clean up. G saar had posted this earlier that MCI is always cleaning up stuff like this. This is normal part of enforcement. This does not mean they should be shut down. Maybe if they are unable to improve....

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp ... 721549.ece

In its website, the MCI has pointed out that it has “not recommended for renewal of permission for 2010-2011” for Sri Manakula Vinayagar Medical College and Hospital and Sri Venkateswara Medical College Hospital and Research Centre in Puducherry. Show cause notice for withdrawal of recognition has been issued to Vinayaka Missions Medical College, Karaikal.

“We have found a few deficiencies in these colleges during inspection. The colleges have been given time to rectify the deficiencies and show compliance. We will then look into it,” a senior official of MCI said.

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 02:20**

Bade wrote: 60% or more students stay put in India these days for good or bad...contrary to what is claimed usually. In the old days the numbers were less for sure.

60% of IIT students or 60% of all engg. students? The latter is believable. If it is the former, we need to count all those who are lost to IAS/IIMs and move out of engg.

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 04:12**

vayu tuvan wrote:Are these all for-profit colleges?

Officially no college or educational institution in India can be for-profit.

Infact until six months, if you generate surplus(profit), you cant be an educational institution in India

http://www.mondaq.com/india/x/387468/Ch ... rofit+They

and then people wonder why iits do not want to take endowments. If the endowment generate a profit, they are screwed

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 20:28**

I'm reposting G saars comments on how the MCI medical school inspections go and the reason schools get into trouble. Looking at the Vinayaka mission hospital they don't appear to be a fly by night type, and definitely not a cowshed. They seem a serious group though obviously a little more aggressive business wise than India is used too...

All this info is available right here on BRF, if anyone is interested in following....

gakakkad wrote:
vayu tuvan wrote:gakakkad: No the friend is not a packee. Exactly the opposite. When he graduated - he was my calssmate from 3rd grade - with MBBS he got a Junior Doctor position in a PHC. He came to my dad for advise asking whether he should take that up or wait for a position in a hopsital in the city. Dad told him to take up the Jr. doctor position (just like my dad himself did - he went in as govt. degree college Asst. lecturer after his MA). My friend did exactly that and has been quite happy ever since. He worked in small rural towns all over AP and is quite happy about the experience. On the financial front he didn't do too bad. About a decade ago he wne tback to school to do fellowship in Anatomy and also taught at a medical college. Now back to govt. service and in-charge of a few PCHs.

This had been happening in AP is what he told me. Now you tell me that most of those fly-by-the-night instis have gone bankrupt indicating that things got tightened in the past few years.
paradoxically , the credit for tightness goes to the baboocracy ...

MCI inspectors are professor from various government medical colleges ... As per rule a new college needs to be inspected every year for the first 5 years (till the first batch appear for final MBBS , the practical exams of the first batch are conducted under the presence of MCI designated inspectors ) .. This rule has always been rigidly followed and hence we have not had any IIPM's in medicine ...

Now , when an inspector comes for a private college , usually he is housed in the best suites in a 5 star hotel and given the best available modes of transport .. He has to verify faculty forms ,and equipement forms and resident forms... He actually has to inspect every single member of the faculty and PG residents and certify their genuineness . In GMCs people ensure that inspectors are sufficiently drunk , for what is an ordeal even for them...

MCI maintains a central database of medical teachers...so if a teacher is registered in more than one places during inspections , it tends to get investigated and such teachers are black listed....Of late this has been implemented very severely ...

Other thing is that if an inspector fills a form in which some facility is marked as present and next year other inspector comes and the facility is marked as absent , the inspector who turned up the first time is questioned...

In a private college , inspectors tend not to get drunk....they ll go around nitpicking ...Supposing a particular facility is not present at the inspection , he may demand a bribe and that way corruption does happen...But that does not put the problem to rest forever..Next year the bribe will have to be given again...So it ends up cheaper to have the equipment , than to keep paying off inspectors...

Most of the time even if you have good facilities , you need to keep paying baksheesh , to keep surprise inspections at bay ...but that baksheesh is usually small...

MCI has cleverly stayed away from admission policy...ie it is not illegal as per MCI to accept NRI /Management quota fees , provided the kid is getting 60% marks in PCB class 12th and 50% in inglees..But that would violate state and other laws...but not MCI laws...

Donations jump up every time there is a new pay commission....In late 90s it was 15-20 lakh INR...Mid 2000s 30-40 lakh INR... Presently 60 lakh to 1 crore INR...By 2020 1.5 to 2 crore assuming the demand remains constant....

For 100 MBBS seats we need 2 professors for each of the 20 subjects ...And 8 to ten assistant and associate profs per subject So you need 40 professors and 200 APs minimum to start a college... The salary of professor has to be higher than what is offered in government ....Presently it will be 1.5-2 lakh per month... An assistant professor is given 70-80k INR per month... So the salary bill comes to 35-40 crore inr / year...This will be doubled in 5 years time as the next pay commission is round the corner...

Initially to get patients u need to subsidize treatments...Bills need to be paid etc... So the cost of running 100 seats of MBBS comes close to 60-70 crore PA ...The only source of income is the donation... You need to charge 60-100 lakh donations just to breat even....

You make real money only after 5 years when the first batch passes and you get full MCI recognition and can start PG courses...

The procedure is similar in the US....Costs are 50 times India's as their salaries are higher ....But usually they seek affiliations with an existing hospital...

For example kalamazoo michigan had a full fledged tertiary care centre for years which ran a large and successful PG residency program...The homer stryker medical college began 2 years ago onlee...

In the US the hospital and the college need not be in the same campus provided it is a reasonable distance...and their is a lot more flexibility that can help reduce costs...for example harvard has 3 affiliated general hospitals and a Childrens hospital... HMS students are posted in any of them depending upon where they want ...That is not permitted in India...

Also it takes a tedious procedure to do oversee electives if u are in an Indian med school... Many forms need to be filled in triplicate...

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 21:13**

@ theo fidel sir u are inadvertently making a bakra out of me....doc prasannasimha sir is a very well known medical educator and doctor and presently HOD/Dean level...he is at least 30 years senior to me..my colleagues are his residents at present...He is most probably even senior to my dad and most of my teachers..and he certainly knows way more about MCI and inspections then I do...so anything he says carries far more gravitas than I do..in fact my present position in medicine is the same as a fellow/superspecialty resident...he teaches/supervises/examines several people like me year after year...

any way what I say is not contradictory to what prasannasimha sir says...

the point is that many instis have opened with the intent of being IIPM .. there was one in gujarat called kerar sal..it closed down after 5 years...thing is that these people think that they can open degree shops and get away with it...but fortunately MCI is too much of a babudom to let that happen...

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 22:30**

Sorry, G saar, I wish there was a way to delete the post if you don’t want me to post it.
------------------------

Which is disappointing because he asked us for full disclosure but did not disclose his own interest in the issue. As he said, he was just a parent WRT the issue. And he refused to explain why this is a Ponzi scheme.
Doesn’t matter how senior you are, if your ideas suck they suck…
-----------------------------

Bottom line is we went through many decades of highly restricted access to higher education which damaged our economy. Today there is no doubt we have too much supply and much of it us uneven quality but in my mind and experience this a far superior situation to what we had before. The idea that restricting supply improves things is baffling to my experience first hand...

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 23:05**

gakakkad, I hope you have asked prasannasimha ji before posting some details abt him and his positions.

@ theo fidel sir u are inadvertently making a bakra out of me....doc prasannasimha sir is a very well known medical educator and doctor and presently HOD/Dean level...he is at least 30 years senior to me..my colleagues are his residents at present...He is most probably even senior to my dad and most of my teachers..and he certainly knows way more about MCI and inspections then I do...so anything he says carries far more gravitas than I do..in fact my present position in medicine is the same as a fellow/superspecialty resident...he teaches/supervises/examines several people like me year after year...

any way what I say is not contradictory to what prasannasimha sir says...

the point is that many instis have opened with the intent of being IIPM .. there was one in gujarat called kerar sal..it closed down after 5 years...thing is that these people think that they can open degree shops and get away with it...but fortunately MCI is too much of a babudom to let that happen...

he would be knowing about MCI and Dr Ketan ~~Parikh~~ Desai very well then.

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 23:19**

The talk was about engineering colleges at that time and yes I spoke as a Parent of a child joining engineering colleges which run these scams Remember the discussion was about AICTE and I have no connection to AICTE and yes .- I gave an example of what happens in medical colleges very much later because I have seen these things happening there too. So I have actually not hid anything(and I think most people here do know I am a Doctor and a Teacher and in fact introduced myself as such when I joined BRF - nothing has been hidden)- I have repeatedly told how these places commit fraud.
If I try to sell a single seat to two people or sell 150 seats when there are only 100 recognized seats- Isn't that a fraud.if you hire recruiters to get and con people from far away states to make students join these and make other students corner seats which are reserved for merit so that they default and transfer it to capitation seats illegally, pay recruiters to recruit students to recruit others and promise seats which turn out to be illegal and non sanctioned - All of these are fraudulent and yes very much like Ponzi scheme. What do you say to scheme which makes the students get involved in fraudulent recruitment and sanctioning of seats- force postgraduates to pretend to be full time staff of the college etc etc. May be you object to the word Ponzi because it is not exactly a pyramid scheme but the intention is very much the same - to set up a chain of people to rip all of them off adn if you go back and read what I wrote - I said

So it is OK to run a Ponzi scheme or fraud and its all about caveat emptor.
In the spirit of full disclosure does anyone here have an financial interest in these colleges
?

Did you see the "or" when I said Ponzi scheme or fraud- you conveniently stick to the word Ponzi when I clearly was giving it as examples of con jobs. !
Also - What was being declared in the spirit of full disclosure - any financial interest in these colleges- I am not a faculty of any engineering college nor had any financial interest in them so you are conveniently distorting it to your convenience. The Medical college example was given much later because I have seen these things and can relate to it more than even engineering colleges (my experience with engineering college behavior was indeed during the admissions that occurred during my Son's batch watching parents suffer due to all the conniving machinations by some of these "esteemed " colleges) and used it as an example of what goes on(and I agree it is worse in medical colleges than engineering colleges because the profits as well as looting are more) - and yes I have no financial interest in any of such medical colleges run by such private establishments so even there it is moot.

There is a difference between setting up suboptimal institutions and fraudulent institutions.The former can be corrected whereas the latter is illegal and trying to argue that something is illegal is OK is just not right. There are many good private establishments who have done good work and provide excellent teaching etc but that is no excuse to excuse those who are conning people. Even government colleges are not spared when they have had inadequate prescribed infrastructure - why should those in private be exempted ?

Posted: **23 Sep 2015 23:46**

Indeed the latest con job is to convert all such Institutions into "Deemed Universities" - that is one big joke (It is a ruse to avoid any regulatory oversight) that is going around- the only criterion to be able to become a deemed university at one time was that it has to be owned by a politician or his relative. It seems that this atrocious thing has been called to a halt now.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 01:16**

Theo saar: That is from nukkad, IIRC. "Parde me rahne do, parda na uthao"

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 01:39**

I'm curious what the problem is with caveat emptor... ...And yes WRT to education and the market for that matter, caveat emptor is very much the name of the game. People need to take personal responsibility for their decisions not go crying to the government that they got ripped off, esp. if no laws were broken. Unfortunately this is the attitude in India rather than learning a lesson and not repeating the mistake. We have gone down this path of trying to control supply demand before with disastrous consequences. I much prefer to trust the market on higher education supply and demand. AICTE and MCI need to stick to regulation which it appears they are trying to, except for this recent back sliding...

Just today I read a report that only 10% of lawyers in some USA schools got a job after graduation, many from shoddy fly by night institutes. So whose fault is this, of course the students are trying to sue the colleges. These are educationally challenged students who should not have gotten a law degree right... ...in a market economy anything goes as long as no laws are broken. Caveat emptor.....
-------------------------------

For all the corrupt and broken down cowshed type places the number of fairly decent/serviceable ones are still a substantial portion. The benefits have far far outweighed the negatives. Could we have a perfect situation, sure we could, but this is India and we have to live with what we can pull off and fix things as we go along. Not strangle the baby in the bathtub, because the water is dirty, and yes the market place is filled with dirty questionable operators. I still can't believe we are having this conversation with the long record of higher education problems behind us.... ....there isn't a perfect situation ahead of us, we need to depend on the market to match supply to demand.

This is classic supply and demand. A basic market situation. There is an intense amount of demand for engineering and medical seats, so there is wild amounts of supply, much of it shoddy but a large chunk serviceable. It doesn't surprise me that now there is a large oversupply of seats, this too is a normal part of supply/demand. There is intense demand so supply wildly increases till it overshoots demand then some supply destruction happens till demand catches up, rinse repeat, this is normal, no need for GOI to intervene. People are asking for 150 seats in a college for 100 is a good thing. Government should make it easier for colleges to expand and supply this demand and not restrict it. If necessary provide grants, locate teachers and provide tax incentives...
-----------------------------

The way I understand this deemed university thing is that it is an attempt to skip the AICTE requirements entirely. I think the better deemed universities will do fine with the recent judgment to evaluate reports. The worse ones should be given an opportunity to improve or have their accreditation pulled.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 02:01**

Isn't not giving accreditation, same as closing down in principle. Would parents spend money to send their wards to lesser ranked places or even no-rank at all, unless one is desperate and has money to burn. Do village folks get duped by these dubious operators, sell their land and gold to get a kid educated hoping for a better future. This needs some amount of protection would you not think. Market forces are fine to a point.

Another thing with some of these colleges which I do not like, is they operate almost like start-ups. They take donations from prospective faculty to get the job. This has an inherent bias to dilute the quality. One could also argue from the other side and say well these teachers are dying to teach and willing to pay upfront for that opportunity...somewhat like a start-up before others chip in after peer evaluation.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 02:34**

>>Just today I read a report that only 10% of lawyers in some USA schools got a job after graduation, many from shoddy fly by night institutes. So whose fault is this, of course the students are trying to sue the colleges. These are educationally challenged students who should not have gotten a law degree right... ...in a market economy anything goes as long as no laws are broken. Caveat emptor.....

US has many shady instis and people offering online degree occupy the space on every one's spam folder...

even genuine instis like drexel univ have a lot of wand waving and ponzi like scheme..

none should be copied by India...US is not a good examplar in everything.

I can and have frequently pointed out the problem in medicine..every tom ,dick and harry cannot and should not aspire to be doctor...it requires a lot of things to even think of becoming one...what is really dangerous is that many pg courses are sub-par and some may be attempted ponzis even..both are bad..

sub par residency programs are truly dangerous...A large number of government college affiliated ones especially in surgical specialty offer very poor training. I know units in government colleges where surgical R1s are NOT allowed to enter the OR...the private ones can be a league of their own because the government usually has decent students (at least 1/2 of them) ..surgery in itself is very complex business...and some subspecialties like cardio-thoracic and neuro are so unforgiving ,that minor errors can often be life and death situations...Take for instance in neuro surgery , the closure of dura mater if the suture accidentally bites , the sub dural vein and causes bleeding , it can result in massive hematoma that compresses brain and kills the patient... (the brain is enclosed in 3 layers of tissue once you open the skull , the outer most layer Dura has to be closed in most brain surgeries)

In cardio-thoracic surgery 3 year course even in the best of instis , you don't learn many operations in 3 years..for instance I don't know anywhere in India that produce CVTS surgeons who can independently do a CABG immediately after McH ..In this case it is not because the instis are sub par...but because it is impossible to learn doing a CABG in 3 years...it takes a lot more time...Our residency programs have a poorly thought after one size fits all approach , that has caused disaster...but this problem can be far more compounded...because there also exists instis that are indeed sub par...for instance the govt insti IPGMR kolkata , runs McH neuro...but did not have a surgical microscope till recently...imagine having a ponzi scheme program ,even on top these...what would be the condition of graduates after that...

this is one of the reason why there is a massive shortage of specialist in surgery..political baboons might assume that having 1000 McH seats of a particular branch will solve the problem because after 10 years we have 10000 people more in the branch...but the problem is that more than 80% of them will not have the confidence of independent practice for 4-5 years...they ll spend time seeking srship/apship..

worst of all imagine their own conditions ...33-35 years old ...working for very low salary...and not being able to do as much has he should be...now these may be good people who have entered government colleges passing entrances at all levels in open quota...but still they are in this condition...now imagine the condition of those , who used reservation / donations /unfair means and indeed are not all that good..

this is one thing we need to learn from the US...in US they have integrated 6-7 years residency in CVTS/ Neurosurgery etc...in india they go through 3 years general surgery and 3 years McH residency.. most of the 3 years in MS are a waste for someone intending to be a CT/neurosurgeon..In the US only the first year is common...other thing is that the programs are made to ensure that they train residents properly...MCI does not do that in India...they merely make sure of existence of teachers and equipment...many hospitals don't give operations to residents...MCI does not intervene in such situations...

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 03:05**

G,

I wish there was a better way but it is impossible to pre-select candidates. Our own examples here on BRF proves it. It is best to let a large number try and then mow the field. Wasteful of people yes but I think India’s long experience/failure with ‘pre-selecting’ should tell us not to try that again. We must let a lot more people try and if they fail it is on them at that point.

Maybe better education and awareness is required for these kids, many of them forced by parents/marriage market/job market into entering professions they don’t really want. I can personally attest it is not easy to ignore family and do what you want....

But the answer to one distortion of the selection process is not skewing the other way and hope it balances out….

The USA is not a good education system, but they don't try to build one. What they try to provide is equal access for all (again not perfect) and then may the chips fall where they fall. Anyone can try to be a doctor or engineer or rocket man, but not all make it through the rigorous testing process. We know this works, in fact it is the only process that works... ...the manufacturing companies in Chennai don't seem to have a problem mowing the field. They are pretty rigorous in their training and performance valuations. The system is working, despite some issues. They do ask that skill levels of applicants be raised but they find plenty of useable applicants from all corners of India. At Samsung other than TN, I met folks from Odisha, Bihar, MH, and they were doing sterling work. I bet they would fail every pre-selection test you gave them though...
----------------------

Bade saar, those who want a MBBS on their house plaque or kalyanam invitation can go to non-accredited colleges. I know quite a few such types, I can very well see them continuing to get students.... ..this is the reality of India. These folks should not be in the real career stream which is where they are right now.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 03:30**

gakakkad wrote:none should be copied by India...US is not a good examplar in everything.

There are lot of good things THe US higher Ed has done right. So copying certain aspects is good. But we should stop at for-profit institutes and online degrees for STEM. There is no substitute to joint in-person team projects as Theo correctly argued.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 03:56**

Theo_Fidel wrote:Bade saar, those who want a MBBS on their house plaque or kalyanam invitation can go to non-accredited colleges. I know quite a few such types, I can very well see them continuing to get students.... ..this is the reality of India. These folks should not be in the real career stream which is where they are right now.

I am not Bade but let me take a stab at that - these people are not going to be in any jobs. It might just be a gimmick to get more dowry or advertisement ploy for their businesses. It is very similar to what used to happen when a local businessman goes to a foreign expo or some such. Huge color photos would be published in the local vernaculars dailies with the foreign returned wearing garlands, photo of the employees (sales counter/accounting/back office) lining up and welcoming the return o the prodigal son/daughter of the Owner etc. Just marketing gimmick. Those who buy degrees at un-accredited colleges are simply buying it for publicity. But the real danger is that a few students from far off places do get attracted by all the publicity and join these places even after taking loans from family and friends.

The real problem in India is lack of information to judge the quality of the institute. Let us take the example of Ashoka University whose website I have been to just a today. Excellent professors/academic council - top class. But I failed to find any information on course content and what each school teaches, or hoe many students are in each school, what is the professor/student ratio, acceptance rates, how many applications, ACT/SAT (or equivalent) scores for cutoff. These are all upfront in any respectable US university. On top of it, the number of courses/majors even medium sized (3000-5000 UG population) schools teach are mind boggling. Even when o much information is available, parents/students still make mistakes. That is the reason why President Obama mooted the College Scorecard idea. The information provided by US News and World Report or Princeton or any of the ranking agencies is qute detailed though one should find out even more by visiting the colleges, narrow the list down to 7-8 and try their luck.

I can see how hard it can be in India where the information is not available that readily. One has to do a lot of word-of-the-mouth enquiries, fees structure including what goes on behind the scenes, antecedents of the promoters and things like whether they are trustworthy etc. etc. etc. etc. ... All this needs to be done in a very short time (may be about a month or two? I'm guessing here). In the US almost in every high school advising starts in 10th grad itself with 11th grade being the hardest for the students and parents. Students receive admission decisions from the schools well before they actually pass out of the HS.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 04:01**

>>I wish there was a better way but it is impossible to pre-select candidates.

US med school is a very rigorous pre selection...there is MCAT, GPA ,Personal IV etc...And they have a 94% graduation rate....87% of those who enter med school enter a residency program...basically 93% of those who graduate enter residency....

In India pass rates are 70-80%in MBBS exams....In US USMLE has 94% pass rate for American grads...and make not mistake , these are very thorough and rigorous exams , the type India ought to have...

The point I want to make is that pre-selection exists in unkil and is useful...

India in medicine cannot afford to not have pre selection...it is expensive training docs...so while we are at it , we need to ensure that we train good ones... while we are mostly known for high quality specialists in urban centers , an important dark secret is not known even to most docs....That most people who enter MBBS don't practice medicine at the level of doctors....those who don't get PG , end up becoming MO'S , which are essentially DOCS working like paramedics...

so our shortage of docs is even way more pronounced ,than what the numbers suggest..so equal access should not be the priority...and of course here 'equal' refers to competence and not money....by all means do everything to ensure that poor have somewhat level playing field to enter medicine...but no more...

I have usually been a proponent of the american like selection system and ensuring a very rigorous PCMB grounding before entering medicine...such a grounding ensures 2 things ...1)candidate will understand what he is taught from day 1...2) candidate demonstrates capability of mastering complex science /math concepts and can apply them in real life situation...there should be no dilution of this...I have given the example of people being unable to understand enzyme kinetics on this thread itself...

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 04:26**

gakakkad: By the time people are able to get admitted to a Medical program =, they would have already gone through a 4 year pre-med course work. Within the first year or two most UGs who would have thought in their HS that they like medicine and are up to the task would find out whether it is so.

As per engg., at least at my US alma mater (which is has been #2 and #3 for several years if not decades) EE department entry requirements are quite tough (entering HS grads). They woul dhave been some of the brightest in their respective high schools. But the about 40% of them drop out of EE - either completely drop out of college or change majors to less demanding ones. They would find jobs because their having gotten into EE program means they have had good amount Calculus, Physics and reasonable Chemistry under their belt.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 05:02**

The filtering process for a medical degree has to be stringent as we are playing with people's lives. India should revert back to the old system of BSc and then MBBS like it used to be 30+ yrs ago.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 05:24**

Bade wrote:The filtering process for a medical degree has to be stringent as we are playing with people's lives. India should revert back to the old system of BSc and then MBBS like it used to be 30+ yrs ago.

While bad doctor can do great damage, bad lawyers and engineers can do much worst. In US Bar examination is quite hard to pass as for as my info goes. Not in India. Any useless fellow can become a lawyer or other professional here and do all the damage they can.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 05:58**

Doctors work without too much oversight in rural areas, outside of hospitals in individual capacity. Engineers less so as they almost always work in a group, so checks and balances are more likely and is usually a long drawn out process. Same with lawyers I would guess, as there are others involved....unless the whole bunch is below standards and work in collusion ...

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 06:16**

Bade wrote:The filtering process for a medical degree has to be stringent as we are playing with people's lives. India should revert back to the old system of BSc and then MBBS like it used to be 30+ yrs ago.

Bade: Everybody (err, everyone who is somebody) is playing with people's lives.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 06:19**

Not as directly as a doc

though. Some of us are many times removed from the disasters caused as a result of our incompetence. That is a luxury docs do not have as they work on the patients directly.

That is one of the prime reasons why I did not want to do medicine, even if aptitude were there. Luckily I was in no such quandary.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 07:08**

The 6 years course would be ideal if carried out in letter and spirit but doesn't work that way unfortunatley.What is happening after FipNB introduced 5 y6 year program- the students are getting virtually no skills in general surgery as they are "Not from our department" and are being used in many private hospitals as "bonded laborers" being neither here or there(primary or basic department) and has lead to a lot of frustrations. Neurosurgery is probably the only surgical science which does not need that much general surgical input (that ccan also be argued) but for every other subject you do need to go through proper general surgical input because you do not operate in isolation but you operate a patient.
Caveat emptor works well if you have everything upfront. How can you expect a parent from a rural area to even understand the complexity of what is happening (when many people here themselves are not aware of the shenanigans that
occur. I have personally seen people suffer because of the wrong choices they made even though they could have got better choices and so much so that I have helped quite a few parents and students through the decision making process. Remember that many parents are out there who are uneducated and are trying to make a better life out there for their children and there must be a process and method to prevent them from being duped. I actually did some distance education course from an Institute which was just for academic interest and next years advertisement showed that they had achieved "placements" etc etc which was clearly fraudulent because nobody had got a placement as they had not even completed the first batches course which amused me at that time but made me realize the depths to which some of these places go. Isn't that misrepresentation. That course meant nothing to me as far as my career or its progression was concerned and was taken more out of curiosity but imagine what a parent who thinks he can get a better future for his child would end up with ? There were many students there who really thought they were doing a course that would change their life.Sadly it was just not true.The course had no legal validity and no one would have recruited them.That is why we need an accreditation system. It cannot be just a wild west out there. if there are deficiencies in the accredition and regulatory system that needs to be addressed - not just say caveat emptor. Even the wild share market were risk is an expected thing upfront has got rules and regulations to follow. Education cannot be allowed to be a Russian roullete

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 07:09**

Make a wrong choice while building a bridge and ti can collapse. The error in judgement in medicine though is often swift and immediate in some branches.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 07:23**

Engineers are seldom pushed as much as emergency room doctors are to make quick on their feet decisions which can make or break a life. It requires a different temperament and attitude in addition to the right aptitude to be a doctor who does little harm as possible to the patient.

Even when a bridge fails it is never a single point failure in the chain of events. Lack of oversight most likely at various stages, and this is true for all engineering projects including all the way to space missions.

Only a scientist (non-medical kind) has the luxury of making several mistakes and learning from each one of them

and decreasing his incompetence level.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 09:45**

A dated article from TOI.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/jobs/Tamil-Nadu-engineering-colleges-ruined-tech-education-IIT-K-head/articleshow/10051216.cms

Indian Institute of Technology-Kanpur chairman M Anandakrishnan has hit out at engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu, saying most of them did not encourage students to go beyond the syllabus and they ruined technical education.

"If I had the authority, I would close down 50% of the engineering colleges in the state. They have ruined technical education. The colleges have become the playground of corrupt politicians," said professor Ananthakrishnan, who has served as vice-chancellor of Anna University.

He said he gets angry when he sees advertisements in newspapers saying that they will "coach" a student to pass or get high marks in engineering subjects.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 10:15**

Bade wrote:Not as directly as a doc though. Some of us are many times removed from the disasters caused as a result of our incompetence. That is a luxury docs do not have as they work on the patients directly.

That is one of the prime reasons why I did not want to do medicine, even if aptitude were there. Luckily I was in no such quandary.

Biut incompetent doctors kill one at a time (two at a time is a stretch

). Engineers might kill a few hundred to a few this and at once. Physicists - well millions if there U.S. nuclear power plant core goes critical. I am not going to speculate about fusion and other unknowns like black holes in a lab and such

but you are welcome to engage in that . Prolly good to continue in physics thread if we want to escape BRF modrones.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 10:22**

Svenkat: what the private (read for profit) colleges are engaged in is nothing short of criminal. You are right in that prof. Ananthakrishnan is on the dot.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 19:44**

VT, if you count that way then politicos are the most responsible of the lot for killing more people. Ban the politics thread. While at it might as well also add the belief based social sciences aka religions to the list of largest killers.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 20:09**

Maybe it is time for private entrepreneurs to start liberal arts and sciences UG campuses instead of just Engg colleges. A blend of STEM and arts with an emphasis on STEM areas perhaps. For this to happen the recruiters have to also move away from entertaining job applications from BE/BTech degree holders even when core engineering skills are not required for the job.

New universities like Ashoka mentioned here should experiment with these ideas. A broad science and mathematics based education for the populace will throw up innovative thinking in the long run.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 20:34**

Why do you guys think competition is not going to weed out the bad from the good? I think just like many other things we are an education-deficient country where there is a demand supply mismatch. I think when the supply takes care of the demand competition is going to kill the bad ones. It is a matter of time.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 20:44**

I am for more in the supply side of education, as it is a dire need as we do not seem to be able to stop our population growth anytime soon. Having said that quality also needs to be imposed from the outside in this inflationary phase of the education system.

We could have depended on market forces alone, if the demand were not enormous and there could have been a nice equilibrium between both forces played over a large period of time of a few centuries to sort things out. When we are trying to do that all compressed over a short period of one generation, stringent standards need to be imposed from the outside.

The expansion of IIT/NIT system is one way to impose calibration, even if it means temporary dilution of 'brand' etc as if often mentioned by alumni. The IISER experiment started over the last decade addresses this for Science Research aspirants. This too has plenty of possible growth like IITs over the next few decades.

The IIEST experiment of converting existing places to a higher standard and ward off political interference of the day is another model to fill the quality gap.

We need multiple approaches and we need more models to this mix, but with good oversight and controls. Market is too naive to set the bar in education with such a rapid rate of growth.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 20:56**

Bade, but atheists AKA communists trump all

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 21:03**

VT, if you include all historical slaughters your statement would not stand.

Coming back to topic again

, there is enough wealth to seed a world class educational institute in each state of India in private hands.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech ... 081966.cms

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 21:43**

What the Europeans achieved in mass and high quality education over 500 yrs we are attempting in about a 100 yrs. So we need the numbers ASAP. Can't wait for IIT stds from the very beginning. If the Nehru-Gandhis had understood this early we wouldn't be left with a piddly 5 IITS for a few decades. I think you can have bad govt schools but you ultimately cannot have bad private schools becoz you will loose money. Eventually. So I am not worried with the mushrooming private colleges and universities as I am pretty sure when the appetite is met people will expect quality which is a good job or a good position. If you run a bad college or university you are eventually going to have to shut it. It can happen as fast as within 20 yrs.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 21:58**

To be fair, other than IITs there were RECs too built over the first 2-3 decades following independence. So for technical education there was an attempt made. Demand exceeded supply since the 80s...when the ball was dropped.

Now that wealth creation is rampant as seen in the link I had provided above, with about more than a $100 billion in countable hands, the finger should point towards the beneficiaries of the early investment by taxpayers, not again at the taxpayers, isn't it ?

These billionaires can provide the gap in the supply side if they care to within a decade or two. Going forward they are the ones who will benefit the most from this investment. So what stops them to do the necessary beyond their contributions as alumni in some cases. What has Reliance/Wipro etc done for higher professional education which they use to create the wealth ? Pointing at the Nehru-Gandhis or whoever does not sound logical or remotely capitalistic or a market driven argument. They did their best as politicos, what about the benefactors of the early policy ?

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 22:08**

I don't believe in the Nehru-Gandhi model. IMO they should have liberalized both the economy and education from the beginning or at least by the 60s. Both were deliberately kept under-performing. There were no demand becoz there were no jobs (most IITians went abroad) and there were no jobs becoz demand was deliberately a function of the govt rather than the market. But that is a different issue. I am following a few of the private universities, following their infra and recruitment and their ambition and I think from that they can only go up. It is not useful to make judgements based on the bottom percentile. But I agree that there should be some broad parameters which should be imposed by the govt and a corruption-free govt regulation. But beyond that interference is not beneficial - in fact beyond a certain point nothing much is going to come out from interfering. I am surprised this is coming from someone based in the US.

Posted: **24 Sep 2015 22:18**

You are quick to point to the dynasty, but what about the capitalists of the day. Tatas and Birlas. Why was not BITS model expanded across the nation ? Same the old IISc (Tata Institute as they call it in B'lur) not multiplied across ? The GoI of the day at least built 5 IITs and multiple RECs to provide for the baseline needs of the nation. Credit should be given where due and to the taxpayers who wholeheartedly support the GoI in their efforts even when their individual needs (quality primary education) was overlooked largely.

Even in the US there is peer oversight of new departments from what I understand. Funding for research for sure is not a given either. NSF and DoE plays the role of DST/DAE in India. AICTE may be a India construct due to the lack of an existing peer review body within the existing structure or universities.

Bharat Rakshak

Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System

Re: Indian Education System