The saga of Indian higher education since the 1960s is complex, variegated, and reflects the country’s development over time. India’s education development has, for much of this period, lagged behind economic and social development. Like India itself, higher education realities are contradictory. India, in 2014, has the world’s second largest higher education system in terms of student numbers, having recently overtaken the USA in enrollments, with 20 million students enrolled in postsecondary education, attending more than 35,500 colleges and 574 universities. It is estimated that more than half of the world’s postsecondary institutions are located in India—many of the colleges are uneconomically small. Approximately 20 % of the 18- to 22-year-old age cohort is in postsecondary education—with a goal of enrolling 25 % by 2017 and 32 % by 2022—an extremely ambitious goal (Rashtriya Uchchartar Shiksha Abhiyan 2013). Dropout rates are high, with many of those who enter the system failing to complete a degree. Quality is generally poor—although there are significant islands of excellence—and the system overall is a sea of mediocrity—none of India’s universities scores well on any of the international higher education rankings (Altbach 2006).

India, like many developing countries, has been swamped by massification—the rapid expansion of higher education enrollments that is the result of an unstoppable demand by growing segments of the population for access. India’s challenges have been magnified by increased demand for access, combined with overall population growth. In no country has rapid expansion been accompanied by improvement in overall quality, and in this respect, India is no different than many other countries (Carnoy et al. 2013).

India had several advantages at the time of independence in 1947, but was unable to capitalize on them. English was the near universal medium of higher education, giving India immediate links to the outside world, access to scientific information, and textbooks. Although fairly small, India had developed a fairly mature higher education system, with several reputable universities and specialized institutions at the top, and a respectable number of undergraduate colleges, a few of which were of international standards. While access was limited to a small urban elite and most higher education institutions were located in metropolitan areas, colleges and universities could be found throughout India.

Though the system grew fairly rapidly throughout most of the post-independence period, population growth and an expansion of primary and secondary education meant that higher education could not keep up with demand. In line with global thinking concerning education and development, emphasis was placed on primary education and not on higher education. In most developing countries, overall quality declined as enrollments increased.

Despite considerable rhetoric in the past few years about India’s higher education “takeoff” and the link between higher education and recent economic growth, there is little evidence that economic success has had much effect on improvements in higher education. Indeed, it has argued that if higher education is not improved, India may lose the advantage of its “demographic dividend” of a large population of young people who could, if well educated, spearhead continuing economic growth (Altbach and Jayaram 2010).

It is worth examining some of the broad trends that characterize Indian higher education. These are presented in no special order of importance. They are, however, linked and constitute a pattern of development over time.

A challenging history

Like much of the developing world, India experienced a long period of colonialism. British rule over much of the subcontinent lasted for several centuries—longer than the colonial experience of most other countries. British-style higher education dates back to 1823, when several colleges were founded. Universities were established at Bombay, Calcutta, and Madras in 1858—around the same time that higher education was expanded beyond Oxford and Cambridge in England (Kaur 2003). When compared to most developing countries, India has had a longer history of modern higher education. For example, higher education was largely absent from sub-Saharan Africa until the 1960s (Ashby 1966).

While the British were in general not avid supporters of higher education in India, they did not prevent its establishment. After a laissez-faire period, higher education was organized as part of colonial policy, ensuring that the language of instruction was English and that the organization and structure of academic institutions conformed to British patterns and policy. The British were more supportive of higher education in India than they were in their colonial possessions in Africa (Ashby 1966). The colonial authorities spent few resources on higher education, and the impetus for the modest expansion of higher education in India during colonial rule was from Indians. Indeed, there were efforts to keep enrollments small, in order to prevent the emergence of a subversive intelligentsia or unemployed graduates. Both of these goals were, at least in part, failures, since educated Indians spearheaded the independence movement. The British sought to ensure that the graduates of the colleges and universities were suited to serve the needs of the colonial administration, rather than emerging Indian society and industry.

At the time of independence, there were 19 universities and 695 colleges, with an overall enrollment of fewer then 270,000 students. By the standards of newly independent developing countries in the mid-twentieth century, India was well situated. It had a relatively comprehensive array of higher education institutions, although few were vocationally or scientifically oriented. The quality of this small system was relatively high. While serving only a tiny proportion of the age cohort—well under 1 %—India had the basic structure of a higher education establishment on which to build.

The challenge of coping with the demands for expansion, combined with political and other pressures on higher education, meant that it was not possible to take advantage of existing strengths and to build for both quantity and quality.

Language: a continuing dilemma

At the time of independence, the language of instruction in higher education throughout India was almost exclusively English. While there are no accurate statistics for English literacy in India, it was quite unlikely that even 5 % of India were literate in English in 1950. Thus, the huge majority of Indians did not have access to higher education. There were fundamental disagreements among the founders of modern India about language policy. Mahatma Gandhi argued strongly for the use of Hindi as the national language. India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, was sympathetic to the continued use of English. Many political leaders in the south and in some other parts of the country were opposed to Hindi and thus favored English as a “link language” and emphasized the use of regional languages in education. India’s federal constitution gave authority over education largely to the states, which had considerable power to decide on language issues. These post-independence realities resulted in a hodgepodge of policies in different parts of the country.

Some of the states in the “Hindi belt” in north India stressed the use of Hindi, and the central government made some efforts to produce and translate textbooks into Hindi, for use in undergraduate education. Almost all of the universities and specialized research institutions, sponsored by the central government, continued to use English as the language of instruction. The states varied considerably in language policy. Most southern states continued English as the main language for higher education. Some permitted the use of regional languages. States in other parts of India varied in their policies. Certain ones used a combination of English and the regional language. In some cases, specific universities preferred to retain instruction in English despite the state policy. Thus, language policy and practice in higher education was, and remains, varied throughout the country.

Without any reliable statistics, it is likely that the use of the English language has increased in Indian higher education, especially in the more prestigious universities and colleges and in the highly selective institutions—such as the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institutes of Management. Much of the private higher education sector functions in English as well. The research sector is entirely dominated by English, and most scholarly communication in journals and on the Internet takes place in English. While the language debate in Indian higher education has not entirely ended, English has emerged as the key language in Indian higher education. Its role, always strong, has increased in importance as globalization has affected the higher education sector in the twenty-first century.

The traditional role of English has given India significant advantages in global higher education. Professors and students can communicate easily with peers in other countries, and mobility is enhanced. Indian universities can more easily enroll international students. Indians may contribute directly to the global knowledge network (Altbach 2007). Yet, there are some disadvantages, as well. English is not the mother tongue of Indians, and it remains to some extent a foreign language. The large majority of Indians do not speak and are not literate in English—thus putting them at a significant disadvantage in the higher education sector and unable to gain access to the social and economic mobility that English medium conveys in India. While there seems to be no accurate estimate of the proportion of Indians who speak English, 10 % seems to be a realistic number. This constitutes more than 100 million English speakers—more than the populations of the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada combined—but still a modest percentage of Indians.

Indian universities in a globalized world

Indian higher education has interacted gingerly with the rest of the world. The higher education sector, as the economy in general until recently, has been largely protectionist. While many Indians have gone abroad for higher education—and many have contributed significantly to technological and economic development in, for example, the Silicon Valley in California as well as in India—Indian higher education has been largely closed to the rest of the world. Non-citizens cannot normally be hired as permanent members of the academic staff, and branch campuses and other foreign academic transplants have not been allowed.

In the past decade, there has been a lively debate in India concerning how Indian higher education should engage with the rest of the world. Kapil Sibal, the minister for human resource development from 2009 to 2012, proposed to open India’s education market to the world and asked parliament to approve legislation for this purpose. However, the legislation was not passed, and thus, India remains largely closed to foreign universities and other education providers. Even if the law had been passed, the conditions for establishing branch campuses and other initiatives were sufficiently unfavorable that few foreign institutions would have been attracted. However, many less formal arrangements have been put into place—including a number of joint-degree programs, franchised arrangements, partnerships, and others. Thus, the door is perhaps half-open.

Some have argued that India is better off developing higher education on its own. Others favor an open door and the idea that the rigors of the market would have a positive impact on Indian higher education. Clearly, India needs good ideas—and insulating the system from international concepts and practices is not helpful.

The sea of mediocrity

Indian higher education can be characterized by a sea of mediocrity, in which some islands of excellence can be found. A large majority of Indian students attend the 574 universities and the 35,500 colleges affiliated to them. While a few of the universities—most notably those without affiliated colleges, such as Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, several other universities sponsored directly by the central government, and some colleges offer high quality—most provide mediocre to poor quality of instruction, most of the 286 public universities that are managed by state governments, 111 private universities, and 129 “deemed” universities provide poor to middling quality education. The vast majority of colleges, particularly newer private college that receive little or no government funding, are of quite low quality. A small number of well-established colleges are managed by state authorities, some of those are established by Christian and other religious organizations, and a small number of others are quite good—but these are a small percentage of the total. As with much in India, there are exceptions to these generalizations. For example, several new nonprofit private universities established by wealthy philanthropists, such as Azam Premji University and Shiv Nadar University, show much promise.

Graduate unemployment in many fields, especially in arts and sciences subjects, is a perennial problem in India. This situation is due in part to producing too many graduates for available jobs in these fields and in part due to the low quality of many degree holders. Even in fields such as management and engineering, where there is demand from employers, graduates from many colleges and universities are considered deficient in quality and poorly trained for the positions available. Employers indicate that they must retrain many of those they do hire.

To some extent, a decline in quality at the bottom tier of Indian higher education is an inevitable result of massification and can be found worldwide. Students with poorer academic qualifications are able to gain access to higher education. In India, the complex system of reservations policy for disenfranchised groups has exacerbated this problem—while at the same time providing opportunities that did not exist before. The existing modest admissions standards are relaxed for these groups, while little extra help is provided for students without adequate secondary school achievement, thus contributing to high dropout rates. The “reservation” system identifies specific historically disadvantaged groups, such as lower caste populations, tribal groups, and “other backward castes,” and reserves a specific proportion of admissions place—and faculty slots—which can be filled only by these groups. The percentage that is reserved is often close to half the total.

Expansion has also brought many new types of institutions onto the postsecondary education landscape—mostly at the bottom of the system. Many of the “deemed universities” are institutions of modest quality—although some of the older ones are well established. New private universities present a similarly mixed picture, with most of lesser quality. Thousands of “unfunded” undergraduate colleges in engineering, information technology, and other fields have emerged in the past several decades and are affiliated to universities and thus able to offer degrees. Again, the overall quality of these colleges is often quite poor, and many are quasi-for-profit institutions.

The traditional universities and their affiliated colleges have proved resistant to reform. In terms of their structure, role, and governance, these institutions have been virtually unchanged for a half-century, despite widespread recognition of their problems. Some reforms have been put into place, such as permitting some of the best colleges to become independent of the universities and offer their own degrees, but implementation has been limited. The entrenched bureaucracy of the affiliating system remains the core of higher education, and until it is significantly improved or modified, essential improvement in Indian higher education will not be possible.

Islands of excellence

Despite the immense problems of the Indian higher education system, a small sector of globally competitive, high-quality postsecondary institutions exists. It is significant that all of them are outside the established university structure. Planners were unwilling to entrust new and innovative ideas to the traditional universities. The best known of these institutions are the Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institutes of Management. There are many others. These include the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, and the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (both in Mumbai), the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata, and others. At least one of the national universities supported by the central government, Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, is held in high regard.

These institutions share several attributes. They are all public and funded by the central government. All are relatively small and are outside of the structure of the traditional universities. These institutions have a significant degree of autonomy that is somewhat unique in the Indian higher education system. They are all initiatives of the central government, with little or no involvement by the states. While none of these successful institutions are lavishly funded—indeed, by international standards, they are all underfunded—they have achieved considerable success.

All of these successful institutions were able to attract professors committed to high standards of teaching and innovation—without paying exceptionally high salaries—showing that some Indian academics are attracted by new ideas and high standards. However, it is sometimes difficult to attract top talent—and some of the Indian Institutes of Technology have experienced difficulties in recruiting. These top institutions also attract the best students in India—and indeed, they and some of the others may be the most selective institutions in the world, accepting only a tiny fraction of the students who take the national entrance examinations for these schools.

The failure of planning

Indian higher education has not failed to create a “world-class” system because of lack of ideas. At least a half-dozen high-level commissions have issued intelligent reports over the past 40 years, starting perhaps with the University Education Commission (Radhakrishnan Report) in 1948, as recently with the National Knowledge Commission Report in 2007, and the Committee to Advise on Renovation and Rejuvenation of Higher Education (Yashpal Committee) in 2009. The most recent effort, the 2013 Rashtriya Uchchartar Shiksha Abhiyan (National Higher Education Mission), is the latest well-documented and thoughtful analysis of current realities and recommendations for the future. These reports have recommended many ideas for thoughtful reform, development, and improvement. Over time, elements of some of these reports have been partly implemented, but in no case at all have any been comprehensively applied. The Planning Commission’s 5-year plans generally paid little attention to higher education, although occasionally initiatives were outlined and funds provided. The current twelfth Plan for the first time gives some comprehensive focus to higher education.

Although most of the funding and supervision of higher education is in the hands of the states, there is little evidence of planning or innovation at the state level. In general, the states have simply tried to keep up with the demand for expansion of higher education. A few have made some effort. Kerala has attempted to think systematically about higher education development, and Gujarat has recently focused on higher education as part of the state’s development strategy in the “Vibrant Gujarat” project.

The University Grants Commission—responsible at the national level for funding, innovation, and planning of higher education under the control of the central government—has developed some small-scale programs in curriculum, teaching, and other areas, but by and large has not played an active role in large scale innovation. The current proposal to establish a National Commission of Higher Education and Research will bring together a number of central government initiatives and provide a central focus for planning, research, and innovation.

As a result of divided control—lack of coordination among the different agencies with responsibility for higher education at the central and state levels, inadequate authority for implementation of change, and inadequate funding—it is fair to say that higher education planning has not been successful, despite a range of good proposals over the years.

The necessity of systems

Massification requires a higher education establishment, with institutions serving different purposes and missions that are organized logically to cater to different clienteles and meet various demands. The best organized ones, such as the renowned California public higher education system, articulates the different kinds of institutions, so that students can move from one type of college to another. In the California case, the public system has community colleges, 4-year and master’s degree universities, and research universities—such as the University of California, Berkeley—that offer doctorates. Students may enter one type of school and, if the quality of their academic work permits, can transfer up to a different type of institution. Systems of this type hold costs at appropriate levels, provide access, and ensure that the various societal needs are met. Government authorities control the missions and budgets of the institutions at the various levels—preventing “mission creep” and ensuring that institutions will stay focused on their established mission.

India has never developed a clearly articulated academic system, at either the central or state levels, although informal systems have evolved over time. India is a federal system, with much of the responsibility for higher education in the hands of India’s states but with the central government having some authority as well. India’s 35 states have little in common and range from Uttar Pradesh, with a population of 200 million, to small states with just a few million. All of India’s universities have a research mission; some are better able to engage in research than others. Few universities at the state level receive adequate budgets for research, and few have a research-oriented academic staff. The rapid expansion of undergraduate arts and sciences and also professional colleges has also taken place largely without planning. The specialized high-quality institutions such as the IITs are treated separately from the mainstream colleges and universities.

The recent centrally supported initiative to establish state higher education councils is a move toward more rational higher policy and planning at the state level. However, only a small number of states, such as Kerala, have fully implemented councils and have appropriate coordinating bodies in place.

India requires, at both the state and central levels, higher education systems that are rationally organized and differentiated in order to ensure that the increasingly diverse needs of higher education can be rationally met.

Politics

Indian higher education, much to its detriment, is infused with politics, at all levels. Colleges are often established by political leaders, as a patronage machine and a way of providing access and jobs for supporters. The location of universities is sometimes influenced by state or local politics. Even national universities have occasionally been enmeshed in politics.

University and college elections are frequently politicized. National, regional, and local political machines are frequently engaged in campus politics. Student unions are often politicized. Academic decisions are determined more by political than academic considerations. Political intrigue and infighting may infuse campus life. In extreme cases, campus politics can turn violent, and disruption of normal academic life is not uncommon. More often than not, the politics is not ideological but rather regional or caste-based.

Universities and colleges, which employ considerable numbers of staff and offer access to a highly sought after commodity—an educational credential—are valuable political engines. Academic institutions are often local power centers and clearly seen as valuable sources of patronage.

As long as political calculations enter into decisions about the location of universities, the appointment of vice chancellors and other academic leaders, approval for establishing new colleges and other institutions, and other aspects of higher education, India will be unable to fulfill its goals of quality, access, and the creation of a world-class higher education system.

A pattern of inadequate investment

Higher education has never been adequately funded. In 2011/2012 India spent a modest 1.22 % of its gross domestic product on postsecondary education—a more modest investment than some other rapidly expanding economies and below European levels of expenditure. From the beginning, emphasis was placed on meeting the demands of mass access and expansion rather than building up a meaningful high-quality university sector, and even financial support for mass access has been inadequate.

The divided responsibility for supporting higher education by the states and the central government was an additional detriment, since coordination was difficult. In any case, most of the responsibility fell to the states, many of which were unable to provide the needed support—and in any case were more concerned with basic literacy and primary and secondary education rather than higher education. Indeed, for much of India’s post-independence history, the concern of policymakers at all levels was for literacy and basic education, rather than higher education.

In the twenty-first century, with the beginning of the Indian economic transformation, higher education has received greater priority. The National Knowledge Commission’s (2007) reports stressed the significance of the universities and encouraged both expansion of access and improvement in quality. Little has been done to implement the recommendations. Without adequate funding, higher education can neither expand appropriately nor improve in quality.

The fall and rise of the guru

At the heart of any academic institution is the professor. By international and particularly developing country standards, the Indian academic profession is relatively well off. While most Indian academics have full-time appointments, service conditions are poor in most private institutions, especially the private colleges. Academics typically have job security, although a formal tenure system does not exist. Salaries, when compared to other countries according to purchasing power parity measures, fall into the upper middle ranks of a 2012 study of academic salaries in 28 countries (Altbach et al. 2012). While Indian academics will not become rich with their salaries, they can generally live in a middle-class style, at least outside of the major metropolitan centers. This is in sharp contrast to many other countries, including China, where academic salaries must be supplemented by additional income.

Yet, the academic profession faces some serious problems (Jayaram 2003). The differences in status, working conditions, and salaries are significant between the large majority of the academic profession who teach in undergraduate colleges and the small minority who hold appointments in university departments and teach postgraduate students. Yet, even college teachers can in general live in a middle-class style, based on their academic salaries, due in large part to significant salary increases in the past few years.

The academic profession is characterized by high levels of bureaucracy and is bound by civil service regulations. Most colleges are hierarchical in structure and provide few opportunities for participation in college governance or decision-making. College teachers, particularly, possess little autonomy and only modest control over what they teach, and teaching loads tend to be fairly high. It has been observed that college teachers have little more autonomy than high school teachers (Altbach 1979). For the large majority of colleges that are affiliated to universities, control over many aspects of teaching, curriculum, and examinations is regulated by the university.

The small minority of academics with appointments in university departments is expected to produce research: they have modest teaching responsibilities and much greater autonomy. Indeed, almost all of the published research by Indian academics is produced by university-based academics and not by college teachers. Salaries are also more favorable. University staffs also supervise postgraduate students and thus play a key role in educating the next generation of the academic profession. Many university departments work closely with the colleges to organize curriculum, set and administer examinations, and carry out the other responsibilities of the affiliating system.

Indian academics are seldom evaluated for their work. Their jobs depend mainly on longevity and rank. Few, if any, efforts evaluate productivity in teaching or research, and those whose performance is seen as marginal are allowed to continue. Salaries are also allocated by length of service and rank for the most part, and there is no way of rewarding good performance or punishing inadequate work. Where top quality is the norm, such as in the Indian Institutes of Technology, it is more the culture and tradition of the institution than any reward system that is responsible.

The Indian academic profession is in a somewhat paradoxical situation (Patel 2012). Compared with academics in other developing countries, Indian postsecondary teachers are not badly off—either in terms of salary or working conditions. Yet, for the most part, the organization of the higher education system does not encourage the academics to do their best work.

An increasingly dominant private sector

India’s higher education system has always been a curious, and perhaps internationally unique, combination of public and private institutions. Almost from the beginning, most undergraduate colleges were established by private interests and managed by private agencies such as philanthropic societies, religious groups, or others. Most of these private colleges received government funds and thus were “aided” institutions. The universities were all public institutions, for the most part established by the states.

This situation has dramatically changed in recent years (Agarwal 2009). Most of the private colleges established in the past several decades are “unaided” and thus fully responsible for their own funding, through tuition charges or other private sources of funds. Where tuition fees are capped, some institutions levy capitation (a kind of required donation) fees and other charges. Similarly, many of the “deemed”—this term refers to an arrangement for government recognition of some institutions as universities outside of the normal pattern—universities are also private institutions—receiving no government funds. Some of the unaided colleges and universities seem to be “for profit,” although management and governance is often not very transparent. Most, although not all, are in the lower ranks of the academic hierarchy. The unaided private colleges are affiliated to a university in their region; and it is increasingly difficult for the universities to effectively supervise the large numbers of colleges, particularly when the financial aspects of the institutions are not obvious.

As in many countries, massification has contributed to the rise of the private sector in higher education. The state has been unwilling or unable to provide funding for mass access, and the private sector has stepped into the void. Public control over the direction of the new private sector has often been lost, and quality has suffered as well. The Indian case is particularly complex, since the public sector universities that provide affiliation to the new unaided private colleges are directly involved in legitimizing and supervising this new sector.

A new trend in private higher education is emerging, as well. In the past several decades, a small number of civic-minded philanthropists have begun to invest in higher education, several of them creating nonprofit universities with high standards and a social mission. The Azim Premji University, for example, focuses on the education system and is attempting to improve teacher education and research on education. These new institutions—if sustained, allowed sufficient autonomy, and endowed with innovative ideas as well as funds—may help to create world-class universities in India.

What has India done right?

If one were searching for international “best practices” or “top ideas” in higher education, there is little if anything from India that would spring to mind. As this essay points out, India’s contemporary higher education reality does not compare favorably with the most successful systems. When compared to the two other developing country BRICs, Brazil and China, India lags behind on most measures of higher education achievement.

At the same time, India has made significant progress in the context of post-independence challenges. India’s policymakers stressed literacy and primary and secondary education in the first half-century of independence and made significant progress in these areas, particularly taking into account continuing population growth. While postsecondary education did not receive the support it required, expansion was steady, and access has been steadily widened. Students from rural areas, disadvantaged groups, and especially young people from Dalit (formerly untouchable) communities have all gained greater access to higher education.

While the quality of Indian higher education has, overall, probably declined over the past half-century, it has not collapsed. The rigidities of the affiliating system and the bureaucratic arrangements have no doubt prevented the segment of the system from improving, but at the same time these systems have ensured stability in the context of continuing stress.

India has produced remarkable talent in the past half-century. The problem is that much of this talent left the country and is highly successful overseas. The statistics concerning graduates from the Indian Institutes of Technology are remarkable: a very high proportion of each graduating class leaves India and achieves remarkable accomplishments overseas. While a small number of graduates return to India, a somewhat larger group, based overseas, works with Indian colleagues and companies. Yet, it is fair to say that the “brain drain” is still alive in the twenty-first century, although it is now combined with “brain exchange” (Saxenian 2006).

A quite small but visible and impressive group of postsecondary institutions has flourished in the otherwise inhospitable soil of Indian higher education. Indian Institutes of Technology, Indian Institutes of Management, and a group of specialized teaching and research universities were built around the edges of the established academic system. Further, a small number among the thousands of colleges affiliated to India’s universities have achieved high levels of excellence in undergraduate teaching. These examples clearly show that it is possible to build world-class higher education in India, if the conditions for development are right.

There is no shortage of ideas for improving higher education in India. Various reports and commissions have pointed to a variety of ways forward. Small-scale experiments and innovative institutions have also proved successful. If these ideas and experiences could be used as templates for improvement, India may be able to move forward.

The challenges ahead

Given the realities of contemporary Indian higher education, it is not possible to be optimistic about a breakthrough in quality. It seems quite unlikely that any of India’s existing universities will soon become world-class. Even if the Indian government were, Chinese-style, to identify a dozen or so existing institutions for massive investment and upgrading, significant reforms in management, governance, and in other areas would be required. It might be more successful to create entirely new institutions, without the constraints of existing universities. The establishment of the Indian Institutes of Technology shows that this can be successful, although in that case it was on a rather small scale. However, India does have the significant advantage of a diaspora that might be lured back for a worthy and realistic cause.

Due to the enormity of the challenges, the private sector will necessarily be a part of India’s higher education future. But, so far, harnessing the private sector for the public good has been problematical. Yet, elements of solutions exist. Many of the traditional private nonprofit colleges provide excellent undergraduate education, as to some private postgraduate professional colleges. A few of the new nonprofit universities seem quite committed to their educational mission.

The greatest challenge is, of course, continued expansion of the system to provide access. India in 2012 enrolls approximately 20 % of the relevant age cohort—well under China’s 26 % and below the other BRIC countries. Thus, India will need to devote resources and attention to continued expansion of postsecondary education. The National Knowledge Commission noted that 1,500 more universities will be needed. It has been estimated that China and India will account for more than half of the world’s enrollment growth, in 2050.

At the same time, India’s increasingly sophisticated economy will need some colleges and universities of world-class standing—institutions that can compete with the best in the world, if manpower needs for the future are to be fulfilled. At the same time, if India is to take advantage of its “demographic dividend” and provide appropriate access and equity, the traditional universities and the thousands of colleges affiliated to them must be improved and reformed—this perhaps is the greatest challenge facing Indian higher education.