I. INTRODUCTION for Indian Higher Education Reform

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India

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Higher Education Reform: From Half-Baked Socialism to Half-Baked Capitalism

Devesh Kapur

University of Pennsylvaniadkapur@sas.upenn.edu

and

Pratap Bhanu Mehta

Centre for Policy Researchparatapbmehta@yahoo.co.inPrepared for Presentation at tbe Brookings-NCAER India Policy Forum 2007New DelhiJuly 17-18, 2007

Conference DraftNot for Citation

INDIAN HIGHER EDUCATION REFORM:FROM HALF-BAKED SOCIALISM TO HALF-BAKEDCAPITALISM

Devesh Kapur

University of Pennsylvania

<dkapur@sas.upenn.edu>

and

Pratap Bhanu Mehta

Centre for Policy Research

<pratapbmehta@yahoo.co.in>

Prepared for presentation at the Brookings-NCAER India Policy Forum 2007New DelhiJuly2, 2007

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“Our university system is, in many parts, in a state of disrepair…In almost half the districts [340]in the country, higher education enrolments are abysmally low, almost two-third of ouruniversities and 90 per cent of our colleges are rated as below average on quality parameters… Iam concerned that in many states university appointments, including that of vice-chancellors,have been politicised and have become subject to caste and communal considerations, there arecomplaints of favouritism and corruption.”Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s address at the 150th Anniversary Function of University of Mumbai, June 22, 2007

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I. INTRODUCTIONThis paper examines the political economy of Indian higher (tertiary) education. The keyargument of this paper is that higher education in India is being de facto privatized on a massivescale.

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But this privatization is not a result of changing ideological commitments of the keyactors—the state, the judiciary or India’s propertied classes. Rather, this privatization has resultedfrom a breakdown of the state system. As a result, it is a form of privatization in whichideological and institutional underpinnings remain very weak. Instead of being part of acomprehensive program of education reform, much of the private initiative remains hostage to thediscretionary actions of the state. Consequently, the education system remains suspended betweenover-regulation by the state on the one hand, and a discretionary privatization that is unable tomobilize private capital in productive ways. The result is a sub-optimal structuring of highereducation. The most potent consequence of this is a secession of the middle class—ironically thevery class whose interests these institutions were supposed to serve—from a stake in publicinstitutions.Our argument proceeds in the following steps. We first provide an empirical mapping of Indian higher education. We then demonstrate that a de facto privatization of Indian highereducation is occurring as a result of the exit of Indian elites from public institutions, to bothprivate sector institutions within the country as well as those abroad. In the next section, weexamine the political economy of Indian higher education and argue that three key variables helpunderstand the political economy of India’s higher education: the structure of inequality in India,

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