HRD Minister expresses dismay at uneven quality of higher education in the country

Updated on: Saturday, November 03, 2012

Union minister Shashi Tharoor rued that the quality of higher education in the country was "extremely uneven" and prescribed specialised training by institutions to its recruits as one of the solutions to bridge the gap.

Speaking at the 2nd convocation of the Max Institute of Medical Excellence here, the new Minister of State for Human Resources Development said there is a dearth of good and quality education in the country though brain is the biggest asset of the people.

"Our biggest asset is brain. But those minds need to be shaped, they need to be nurtured and they need to be trained. When it comes to higher education, the quality is extremely uneven. On the one hand, we have world-class institutes like IIT and IIM," he said.

"And on the other, we have second rate and even third rate universities which produce graduates. But most of them end up unemployed and this is the reality which we face," the former UN diplomat told students.

To bridge the gap, Tharoor's prescription is that institutions should pitch in and train their own recruits so that they make up for the lost time in their universities.

He cited such institutional training by software majors Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services as examples and suggested that other institutions could also emulate them.

Degrees to future healthcare professionals were awarded at the function.

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