Go For The Money: Other higher education institutions should follow IIT Bombay’s example, make aggressive fundraising efforts

Source: The post is based on the article “Go For The Money: Other higher education institutions should follow IIT Bombay’s example, make aggressive fundraising efforts” published in The Times of India on 22nd June 2023

Syllabus: GS 2 – Education.

Relevance: About fund crunch in Higher Educational Institutes.

News: Nandan Nilekani donated $38. 5 million to his alma mater IIT Bombay. This raises the question of why many of India’s public education institutes are so lagging in fundraising.

About the performance of the Higher Education Financing Agency (HEFA)

It is a designated body to help raise funds. It was founded in 2017 and is a non-profit lending company for higher education institutes’ infrastructure projects.

By the end of last year, HEFA had approved 141 projects worth just ₹46,700 crore, against the target of ₹1 lakh crore.

HEFA would raise funds from the private sector, but no details are available. The government as an equity contributor put in ₹1 lakh in 2022-23, and zero in 2023-2024.

What are the impacts of the fund crunch in Higher Educational Institutes?

a) 11,000 teaching posts are vacant across institutions, including central universities, b) When fees are increased, students either drop out or move overseas, as in the case of medical students. Since 2017, over 30 lakh students have gone abroad, 7. 5 lacks in 2021 alone.

What should be done?

The government understood that government funding alone cannot make institutions world-class. So, the government asked central universities to set up endowments, including FCRA accounts.

NRI corporate leaders are more generous in giving endowments to American universities. But most of them have contributed little to India’s institutions as they lack effective sales pitches like IIT-Bombay. India has 169 billionaires; 1,103 individuals with ₹1,000 crore-plus wealth. They also donate less. So, India should tap private wealth.