CHALLENGES BEFORE HIGHER EDUCATION IN INDIA

Mr. Rohit Sharma*

Dr. Nishta Rana**

Abstract

Education is the strength of a nation and developed educational system leads to developed
nation. It has been observed worldwide that economic success of any nation can be directly
determined by their education system. Indian higher education system is the third largest in the
world next to the United States and China. Since independence India had progressed a lot in the
field of education. Although there have been lot of challenges to higher education in India but
equally have lot of opportunities to overcome these challenges and to make higher education
system much better. There is need of greater transparency and accountability, the role of colleges
and universities and scientific research is of utmost important. India needs Skilled Graduates
who can drive our economy forward. Indians have an immense potential, need is to harness that
potential so that dream of India becoming a developed nation by 2020. The present paper aims to
highlight some of the challenges faced by higher education in India. At the end, suggestions have
been made to develop our higher education system so that our future generations will be able to
compete at global level and make the higher education institutions world class.

*Student, PG Department of Chemistry, Government P.G. College (Boys) Udhampur,

rohitsharmajmu482@gmail.com

**Associate Professor (Deputy Head), P.G. Department, MIER College of Education, Jammu,
180001, drnishtarana@gmail.com, nishta.rana@miercollege.in
INTRODUCTION

After independence one of the biggest challenges for us was to develop a great and strong
educational system. In order to achieve this aim various educational policies were started but no
fruitful results have been obtained. What we had seen is the change in the government from time
to time but the educational system remains static as such. With the coming of global scenario,
challenge becomes even bigger for the Indian higher educational system in order to compete with
the global standards. It has been observed that we lack skills in graduates of various streams
(Humanities social sciences, natural sciences and commerce) as well as from various
professional disciplines (Agriculture, Law, Management, Medicine or Engineering)

We have to understand traditional classroom teaching will not work today as we are using this
approach right from independence. We have to shift our approach to innovative learning and
innovative methods if we have to compete on global standards and if we want to really pace up
with the Global community in terms of better and advanced innovative practices especially in
teaching learning.

As we know in higher education, universities play a vital role in bringing the change which is
needed or we can say that how long we remained stagnant and static. We have to change the
system in order to address the concept of access, equity, relevance and quality which can be
operational only when the system is both effective and efficient. A systematic approach should
be needed in order to develop the human resource and networking of the system through ICT.

Some of the basic challenges before higher education are:

 Inadequate structure and facilities

 Large number of vacant faculty positions
 Poor faculty
 Low student enrolment rate
 Outdated teaching methods
 Declining research standards
 Demotivated students
 Overcrowded classrooms
Major challenge for us is to provide equitable access to quality higher education for students
coming from poor families.

When we think of research in higher education it is at lowest level due to inadequate and
diminishing support from the government and the society. The condition of the college in rural
areas is pitiable as these are non-viable, under enrolled having poor infrastructure and facilities
with just a few non-skilled teachers. Moreover, the biggest problem is the absence of well
informed agenda for higher education in the country.

Although there are various challenges before higher education but following are some of the
leading challenges before higher education which needs special attention:

 Continuous upgradation of curriculum to keep in pace with rapid growth of science

and technology.
 Globalization and resultant challenges from the international universities.
 Grooming of many private institutions without ensuring maintenance of quality and
standard.
 Need of adequate funds to meet the demands of innovative programmes
 Developing a meaningful and purposeful interface between the universities
 Gap in Supply and Demand
 Mushrooming of Low quality institutions
 No Project Based learning
 No Strategy.

We need educational programmes, policies and a system which will reach to all the areas in the
country so that no one left to which access is not reached. According to our constitution it is the
role of both centre and state to build good educational system. The central government prepares
policies and plan things while the state government has the responsibility to run these policies on
ground to check their applicability at ground level.

We should not compromise with quality at any cost and it must be checked at regular intervals
by the respective body to ensure that we are moving in right direction as we have to take our
country forward and compete with the rest of the countries at the global level. There is an urgent
need to focus on quality and standards rather than on quantity and enrolment.
Time has come that we have to modernize our educational system in order to get much more
technical graduates which will take our nation to developed state.

If we talk of current scenario, India is a country which has the largest number of youth
population but our youth has a craze and hunger for foreign education in order to get better
facilities and better quality system there. The question is we not able to create such facilities? If
we are able to do so we will stop the brain drain and thus avoid the situation of youth running
away from country and settle abroad.

What have we seen right from independence is that governments came and gone but system does
not change. As we know that higher education is diverse, so challenges faced by the higher
educational institutions are also diverse. Process of education does not mean digesting books but
involvement in co-curricular and extracurricular activities which will give a broad meaning to
life in general and education in particular. Lack of proper facilities is a key challenge and if in
some cases facilities are available but there is lack of valueable information about the same. Lack
of universities and institutes for education but quality is absent with very few teachers whom
knowledge is insufficient.

When we observe or analyse students approach in the current educational setup, we find that
students just want marks in subjects and study only for getting jobs. There is lack of creativity in
them. It is no doubt that our toppers or top class students are hard workers but at the same time
they are not innovative. They are unable to produce new technology. There is a great need to
revolutionize the higher education sector if we have to take our country forward towards
developed India by 2020. What does our nation want is not Graduates or Post graduates but
skilled graduates or postgraduates so that level of unemployment declines and as a result GER
Percentage increases.

SUGGESTIONS

 Towards a learning society

 Industry and academia connection
 Incentives to teachers and researchers
 Innovative practices
 To mobilize resources
  Coming of information age
 Student centered education and dynamic methods
 Public private partnership
 To provide need based job oriented courses
 International cooperation
 Coming of information age
 Student centered education
 Towards a new vision
 Cross culture program
 Action plan for improving quality
 Individuality
 Accountable privatization of higher education
 Quality development
 World class education
 Personality development
 Focus academic research studies
 Stipends to research fellows
 Fair quality assurance system
 To increase quantity of universities
 Examination reform
 High tech libraries

CONCLUSION

To conclude we can say that I ndia is a nation of immense potential and it is one of the fast
growing economies of the world in term of both GER and GDP. But apart from this education is
still not been able to some poor population who undoubtedly had talent but due to lack of
facilities they are unable to contribute to the society and finally to the nation. It is no doubt that
there are a lot of opportunities but how to get benefit from these opportunities and how to make
them accessible to others is a matter of concern. In order to sustain the growth rate we had to
increase our higher education institutions and at the same time improve our quality of education.
To achieve this noble aim we have to restructure our educational system such that it no longer
remains teacher centered but shift toward student centered. There is an urgent need to relook at
financial resources, access and equity, quality, standards, relevance, infrastructure and at the end
the responsiveness.

REFERENCES

Arunachalam P. (2010). Higher Education Sector in India: Issues and Imperatives. Journal of
Global Economy, 6(4)

Bhattacharya, J. (2012). Higher Education in India: Issues, Concerns and Remedies. University
News: A Weekly Journal of Higher Education, 50(17), 1-4.

Padhi, S.K. (2011). Issues, Challenges and Reforms in Higher Education for a Knowledge
Society

Ransure, P. (2017). Higher Education System in India: Emerging issues, Challenges and
Suggestions. International Research Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies, 3(8), 1-6.

Sheikh, Y.A. (2017). Higher Education in India: Challenges and Opportunities. Journal of
Education and Practice, 8(1), 39-42.

Higher Education in India: Issues, Concerns and New Directions

http://www.ugc.ac.in/pub/heindia.pdf