Chapter 4: The University Stream

Introduction

In Chapter 2, a brief account of the University Stream and the broad structure of university courses have been given. This Chapter deals with the nature of Indian Universities.

The entry of westernised pattern of education and the birth of the university system were the result of the 1854 despatch of Sir Charles Wood, well known as Wood’s Despatch, to the Governors of the East India Company. It laid down guidelines for founding of a university system modelled on the University of London, that would affiliate the existing colleges, set standards for courses, prescribe appropriate textbooks, conduct examinations and confer degrees. Thus the Universities of Calcutta, Mumbai, and Madras came into existence in 1857. For nearly 25 years, the higher educational needs of the entire British India were met by these three universities. In 1881, the University of Punjab (now in Pakistan) was established, followed by the University of Allahabad in 1887. To cater to the needs of the North and the Central India.

The Indian Universities Act of 1904 had defined more explicitly the role of universities. It stipulated that the universities should assume more responsibilities for teaching, provide opportunities for research and exercise effective control over the colleges affiliated to them. In 1915, the Banaras Hindu University was established as a teaching and residential university without the power to affiliate any college. It was followed by the establishment of the Universities of Mysore (1916), Patna (1917) and Osmania (1918). In 1917, the Calcutta University Commission under the chairmanship of Sir Michael Sadler, recommended setting up of Intermediate Colleges to offer a two-year sandwich course between high school and degree levels. While the Calcutta University did not accept the recommendation, several other universities, like the Punjab and Allahabad, implemented it. The Sadler Commission also emphasised the need for residential universities. Thus, during the 1920s several residential universities came into existence, which included Aligarh Muslim University (1920), Lucknow (1921), Dacca (now in Bangladesh) (1921), Delhi (1922) and Annamalai (1929). Three other universities established in this decade are Nagpur (1923), Andhra (1926) and Agra (1927). During the same period postgraduate departments were set up in a number of universities and research activities were encouraged.

The growth of universities slowed down considerably during the Second World War period. Only four universities were established during this period, viz., Travancore (now Kerala University), Utkal (1943), Saugar (now Doctor Harisingh Gour Vishwavidyalaya) (1946) and Rajasthan (1947). The first university established after Independence was the East Punjab University (now Punjab University) consequent upon the partition of the erstwhile Punjab Province. Thereafter, there had been a spectacular proliferation of universities, the number of which now stands at 255. Government of India had decided to establish one more Central University named Mizoram University. The Mizoram University Bill, 1999 has been passed by the Rajya Sabha on 23 December, 1999.

Universities can be established under a Central Act (Central Universities) or a State Act (State University). Of the 255 universities, 182 are State Universities and 17 Central Universities (See Annexure 1). Besides, there are also two other categories of university level institutions-institutions deemed to be universities or simply “Deemed universities” and “Institutions of National Importance”. “Deemed Universities” are institutions that are conferred the status of a university because of their long tradition of teaching, or specialisation and excellence in a particular area o knowledge, e.g., Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics (Pune), Tata Institute of Social Sciences (Mumbai), Birla Institute of Technology & Science (Pilani).

They enjoy complete autonomy in respect of developing and innovating academic programmes on their own. The “deemed university” status is granted by the University Grants Commission (UGC) in accordance with Section 3 of the UGC Act, 1956 with the approval of the Department of Secondary and Higher Education in the Ministry of Human Resource Development. The number of such deemed universities at present is 43 (See Annexure 2). The “Institutions of national importance” are established or so designated by Acts of Parliament. So far 12 such institutions had been established, which include the six Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and the Indian Statistical Institute (See Annexure 5).

India has the distinction of having five universities exclusively for women (See Annexure 4). All the universities and university level institutions are members of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU) (See Chapter 7-Regulatory Authorities). Table 1 and 1A in Annexure 5 give state-wise distribution of universities by categories (State, Central, Deemed and Institution of National Importance) and by types (Traditional, Open and Subject universities) respectively. Three other tables in the same Annexure give some other related data.

The universities established by State and Central Acts are basically of two types- unitary and affiliating ones. The unitary universities have a single campus and largely concentrate on postgraduate studies and research, though some may also have provision for undergraduate programmes, e.g., Aligarh Muslim University, Banaras Hindu University, Jawaharlal Nehru University. Some of the unitary universities have also colleges under them known as university colleges or constituent colleges. Affiliating universities generally have a central campus on which are located departments or schools or institutes that impart postgraduate centres located outside the campus in different districts. Affiliating universities may also have university colleges (within the campus) as well as constituent colleges (outside the campus). These universities have variable number of colleges affiliated to them. They are located in districts within the jurisdiction of the university as specified in the Acts. There are more than 9200 colleges affiliated to universities. Most of the Indian universities are of the affiliating type with the larger ones like Calcutta, Mumbai, Bangalore, Osmania, each having more than 250 affiliated colleges under its wings with enrolment of students exceeding one lakh. The University Grants Commission has now established the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) in accordance with Section 12CCC o the UGC Act, 1956, to assess the quality of education imparted by universities and colleges and grade them accordingly. This has been discussed in Chapter 8 (Recognition, Accreditation, and Ranking of Institutions).

Affiliated Colleges

There are two types of affiliated colleges: government colleges, and privately managed colleges. The colleges offer mostly undergraduate courses, though some of them also have introduced postgraduate courses in selected subjects. Most of the affiliated colleges offer courses in arts, science and commerce. In addition, there are also technology, management, education, law. The government colleges constitute about 15-20% of the total. They are managed by the State Governments concerned. As many as, about 70% of the colleges, have been established by privately managed trusts or societies. Nearly 33% of these colleges are located in rural areas. However, many of them are non-viable because of low level of enrolment. The management committees of the private colleges are constituted according to the norms laid down by the statutes of the university concerned.

Their relationship with the university is also defined by the respective university act and statutes. Though established through private initiative, many of them now receive considerable financial support from the concerned State Governments. The power of granting affiliation to a college vests with the respective universities and is exercised in consultation with the State Governments. As stated earlier, like unitary universities, several affiliating universities also have university colleges as well as constituent colleges, which are managed by the university itself. The university to which colleges are affiliated lays down the courses of study, conducts their examinations and awards the degrees.

As regards professional colleges, a large number of them have been established by private trusts and societies. In the States of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, there has been a phenomenal growth in the number of privately managed professional colleges. They do not receive any financial assistance from the State Governments. As a result, in almost all cases, they charge heavy fees to cover capital costs, recurring and other expenditures. However, a Supreme Court judgement had laid down a number of guidelines for admission and fees to be charged by such colleges.

Autonomous Colleges

Among the affiliated colleges, there is a special category called autonomous colleges. The national Policy of education (1996) had advocated granting autonomy to colleges and also to university departments with the object of bringing about decentralisation of academic administration, promoting innovation and ensuring higher standards. An autonomous college enjoys academic freedom to prescribe its own rules of admission, designing of curriculum, mode of conduct of examinations, and introduce innovations in determining the courses of study and evaluation. The affiliating universities accept the methodologies of teaching, evaluation and examination, course curriculum, etc., adopted by these colleges. However, the degrees are awarded by universities and the names of the colleges are mentioned in the diplomas. The National Policy of Education envisaged 500 autonomous colleges by 1995. However, as on 31 March 1999, there were only 123 autonomous colleges affiliated to 28 universities spread over eight States. They are mostly in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. Tamil Nadu has the largest number (55), which includes some of the oldest and best-known colleges like Loyola College, Presidency College, Madras Christian College and RK Mission Vivekananda College. The renewed effort of the UGC to grant this status to more number of colleges had met with stiff opposition from several universities.

Self-financing Colleges

Among the affiliated colleges are also the self-financing colleges. Some University departments too have introduced self-financing courses. As the name suggests, they survive on the money earned by collecting hefty tuition fees and other levies. The self-financing colleges, both for right and wrong reasons, are perceived as a source of profit for greedy entrepreneurs who capitalise on the large gap between demand and supply of seats in existing colleges. Whereas self-financing professional colleges affiliated to universities follow the same curricula and courses as are offered by public funded colleges, self-financing arts and science colleges, also affiliated to universities, prefer to offer, instead of conventional subjects, professional or quasi-professional courses such as business administration, bank management, company secretary-ship, biochemistry, microbiology, electronics, catering technology and hotel management, fashion design, computer science, visual communication. A brief account of such courses has been given in Chapter 51 (Vocational Education). In Tamil Nadu, during the last two decades a record number sot 140 such self-financing colleges have come into existence, because of the decision of the State government not to provide grants to new colleges. As against these, there are 120 private aided colleges and fewer than 70 government colleges.

Recognised Institutions

Besides granting affiliation to colleges, many universities also recognise research institutions as centres for doctoral research where students can work for their Ph.D. degrees. Some research institutions are also considered as associate departments, which offer specialised programmes, e.g., the Central Food Technological Research Institute (Mysore), conducts M.Sc. (Food Technology) course and the Central Sericulture Research and Training Institute, Mysore conducts M.Sc. (Sericulture Technology) on behalf of Mysore University.

Erosion of the Affiliation System

The system of affiliation seems to have been diluted over time, as would be evident from many admission advertisements appearing in newspapers. Many institutions offering professional courses, mostly in management and computer fields, relate themselves to universities and their “associate” and “approved” institutions or “approved study and examination centres”. Such institutions are often located outside the territorial jurisdiction of the concerned universities. In some cases, the institutions claim that their courses are approved by specific universities, although the awards are not necessarily university degrees. Some universities are also entering into franchise arrangements with private institutions for offering courses in different branches of management and computer science. A case in point is the Makhanlal Chaturvedi Rashtriya Patrakarita Vishwavidyalaya (Bhopal). It was established in 1990 aimed at developing “a national centre of teaching, training and research in Journalism and Mass Communication in Hindi. The university has franchised its Bachelor of Computer Applications (BCA) course to a large number of institutions throughout India. Several universities have also started indiscriminately franchising their correspondence courses in computer (BCA) and management (BBA). This has been discussed in chapter 6 (Learning from a distance). Several deemed universities have started establishing extension centres in different states.

Tie-Ups

A noticeable recent trend is universities entering into tie-up arrangement with well-known private computer institutions for launching specialised computer courses. For example, Bharathiar University (Coimbatore) has tied up with SSI to offer a two-year M.Sc. (Software Applications) course through distance learning mode. The Directorate of Distance Education, Annamalai University offers a course leading to Bachelor’s degree in Development and Information Technology (B.DIT.) in collaboration with Aptech. The Mysore University had also announced its tie-up arrangements with computer firms such as Aptech, CMC, C-DAC to offer a number of Information Technology courses.

Subject Universities

While most of the “deemed universities” and “institutions of national importance” deal with specific subjects, there is now a new trend of establishing subject-oriented universities in various States. To begin with, one agricultural university was established in each State. All colleges of agriculture, forestry, veterinary and animal husbandry, and home science affiliated to different universities in the State, were transferred to this university as its constituent colleges. The number of agricultural universities is 28. (See Annexure to Chapter 43) and technology universities in some states and all the professional colleges in these subject fields have been brought under their jurisdictions. Table 2 and 2A in Annexure 5 give the discipline wise and state-wise distribution of subject universities.

Open Universities

Another recent development is the establishment of exclusive Open Universities. Traditionally, a large number of universities, during the last three decades or so, had been offering correspondence courses (distance education or distance learning as the system is now known) for the benefit of those, who for various reasons cannot pursue higher studies in colleges and universities. While as many as 60 universities now offer correspondence courses, ten separate universities, called Open Universities, (See Annexure 1 to Chapter 6) had been established in different states for providing education exclusively through distance learning mode. Chapter 6 deals with Distance Education.

Admission

Increasingly, entrance tests are being introduced by universities to regulate admission to postgraduate courses, because the number of aspirants far exceeds the number of seats available. In some states, State-level Common Entrance Tests are conducted to admit students both at the graduate and postgraduate levels. This has been discussed in Chapter 9 (Admission Procedures). A certain percentage of seats in professional courses are reserved for candidates belonging to Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST) and Other Backward Communities (OBC). Seats are also reserved for NRI candidates and candidates sponsored by NRIs. They are exempted form appearing in entrance tests.

Academic Year

The academic year normally starts in June or July and ends in March or April followed by summer vacation. Institutions located in mountainous areas have a different schedule, where academic session begins in March and ends in December followed by the winter vacation. In most universities, which conduct annual examinations, the academic year is divided into three terms. A small number of universities have introduced the semester system. The accepted norm is that there should be 180 actual teaching days in a year. However, for various reasons often beyond the control of the authorities, the target is not always attained. The commencement of the authorities, the target is not always attained. The commencement of the academic sessions, more often than not, is delayed in many States for various reasons. In particular, in professional colleges, delays in the completion of a complex process of selection formalities based on common entrance tests, result in the loss of somewhere between three and six months.

Educational Programmes

The educational programmes, at the Bachelor’s level generally involve study of a fixed number of subjects with little flexibility. In the case of arts and humanities stream, a student is students is usually required to study four subjects in the first year, three in the second year and one (in Honours degree) or three (in general or pass degree) in the third. There are restrictions on the subject combinations that can be chosen. For example subjects of the science stream cannot be taken with those or arts and humanities (except mathematics and geography). In the science stream, it is usually not permissible to opt for mathematics and physics with botany or zoology. In 1994-95 the UGC has introduced vocational subjects in the first-degree programmes (See Chapter 51-Vocational Education and Training)

Duration of University courses

A board idea of the duration of university courses has been given in Chapter 2. Annexure 6 provides additional information about the durations of some major courses. Of late several universities have introduced five-Year integrated courses after 10+2 leading to the award of Master’s degree. Similarly Integrated Ph.D. programmes after graduation have also been introduced (See Annexure 7).

Medium of Instruction

The medium of instruction for professional courses and postgraduate level courses is almost exclusively English. In the arts, humanities, and commerce faculties both English and the regional language are used. The 26^th editions of the University Handbook (1995) gives university-wise detailed report on the media of instruction and media of examinations for the undergraduate and postgraduate courses in various faculties of universities and university-level institutions.

Examination Systems

In case of universities following the annual pattern, an end-of-year examination is held between March and May and the results are announced after about two months. Supplementary examinations are held in October or November. Universities following the semester system conduct the examinations in November-December and March-April. White most examinations are conducted by universities, in order to reduce the workload on them, some affiliating universities have reduced the number of university examinations for the first-degree level. The engineering, medicine and management colleges have generally adopted internal assessment system and letter grades and credit point system. (See Chapter 10-Grading Systems in Universities).

Nomenclature of Degree

As stated earlier, under Section 2 of the UGC Act, a “Degree” means a degree, which is specified by the UGC by notification in the official gazette. This implies that no degree is valid unless it is specified as such by the UGC. Despite this stipulation many universities have introduced a wide variety of nomenclature of awards, which are not found in the list of approved degrees. (See Chapter 11-Nomenclature of Awards).

Naming of Universities

While in almost all the countries of the world, universities generally bear the names of states, regions or places where they are located, it is only in India that nearly 40% of the universities and university-level institutions are named after politicians, religious leaders, social reformers, historical personalities and donors of funds and often embellished with such prefixes as Doctor, Acharya, Pandit, Mahatma, Chaudhuri, Sadhu, Guru and so forth. Ironically, the names of the persons so honoured remain immortalised in a set of alphabets, because brevity is prized over prolixity! So, Acharya N.G. Ranga Agricultural University becomes more well known as ANGRAU and Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Open University as D-BRAOU.

Names of universities that do not indicate the location can be confusing. For example, there are two universities named after DR. Ambedkar (There are as many as eight universities named after him) - Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Open University in Hyderabad and Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Open University in Ahmedabad. The confusion is further confounded when the names of old universities are changed, for example, Agra University, which was established in 1927 is now renamed as Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar University. The Bhopal University (1970) became Barkatullah Vishwavidyalaya. The name of the Kanpur University (1966) was first changed to Shri Shahu Ji Maharaj University and then to Chhatrapati Shahu Ji Maharaj University. Perhaps the universities are aware of this problem as would be evident from the fact that in admission advertisement the original name is added in parenthesis, e.g., Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar University (formerly Agra University), Barkatullah University (formerly Bhopal University).