You had suggested one unified body for accreditation of educational institutions but the proposed bills on higher education seem to indicate otherwise....
A deep understanding of the issue is missing. We had suggested that the AICTE, the MCI and the UGC be abolished and replaced by one body, as the thinking at the highest level should be the same. But that is not what is happening. I personally think if we go away from this principled philosophy, then you might as well forget and not do any damn thing. A “langdi” institution will only do more harm.
It’s not easy to get bureaucrats away from a thing like this. There is a turf war and no one wants to let power go away from their hands. The question is why should turf boundaries between ministries decide what we do in education? This is a move to introduce more and more bureaucracy in education. There are people around with vested interests...and MCI has shown that. We created as good a report as possible but in trying to create an administrative process, they’ll mess it up.
There were fears that there would be too much centralisation in such a national body....
Yes, but we had suggested an independent body not under any ministry or department and consistent with India’s federal structure.
There is a proposal for a collegium with powers that would clash with the council?
We had only suggested a collegium of people without vested interests. They took it literally. If the collegium is proposed to be so powerful, what will the commission do?
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