New Delhi: The government should completely eliminate the Rs 20,000 crore annual subsidy in higher education, giving institutes a free hand to fix fee structure after reserving a quarter of the seats for the underprivileged at a nominal fee, a leading industry body has suggested.

"Flexibility in fees will meet the needs of overall development funds. The highly subsidised higher education students fees not covering even five per cent of the university/college budget is an important reason for falling education standards," the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (ASSOCHAM) said in a 20-point charter of suggestions submitted to the Union HRD Ministry.

Stating that the higher education sector was getting Rs 20,000 crore annual subsidy, the body said the fee should be fixed in such a way so that it covers cost of infrastructure, provision for research and teachers salary.

"With meagre resources at their disposal, many universities are not even able to provide basic lab and library facilities let alone attract the best of talents for teaching jobs," the organisation said.

The ASSOCHAM said 25 per cent of seats can be kept reserved for the underprivileged students at a nominal fee while others can pay through bank loans. It also suggested that the government can stand as guarantor to ensure that students can avail of loans easily.

The industry association also suggested "freeing education from the clutches of government control" to enable more enrolments. "Remove all entry barriers and controls in setting up new universities/colleges and institutes of higher education." 

The government should only monitor quality of education through mandatory yearly assessment studies for all institutes, whether they are in public or private sector, the industry body said.

The ASSOCHAM also recommended that each college or university be allowed to set their own study material, style of teaching and examinations to help in "innovation, creativity and out-of-the-box thinking".

However, at an ASSOCHAM function yesterday, Union HRD Minister Arjun Singh seemed to disagree with some of the suggestions.

"We cannot leave it to the market forces to control higher education," the Minister said.

"Education cannot be bought and sold over the counter. Higher education will be meaningless if it is not accessible to all," Singh said.

He cautioned against initiating reforms in the education sector just because "talk of reforms was fashionable".

Source : PTI