Finally, the Supreme Court has given its opinion and now the media and blogworld would be on fire. While politicians think about how to make political capital out of it, educational administrators would seriously explore how to further balance their profits and quality of education. HR personnel would ponder if reservation can enter private sector and if so, how will it affect their paradigm..

While Supreme Court Judgement is reasonable, I really feel bad that neither the top government representatives (Judiciary, Legislature, Bureaucrats) nor the economic pundits seriously reflect on the problem and the solution.

****************

The problem statement in India is that people from backward communities do not get sufficient opportunities to pursue higher education or avail government jobs. These two, if made available, are supposed to expose people to lot more economic and social opportunities.

There could be endless arguments and counter arguments on the reality behind the issue. I would limit myself to Reservation in Higher Education in this blog.

The Supreme Court's judgement on Reservation in Higher Education is not a right one. It does not address the real problem. Higher Education is the foundation stone of life in modern economy.

**************
The issue of reservation in higher education is like fighting for the meager food on the table, between members in a family. The problem is not who gets what. It is not distribution.

The problem is there is not enough food on the table.

Until the food on the table becomes sizeable, the fight between members will not stop. Today, in education, that is the case. There are not enough affordable higher educational opportunities in India. And that is the problem. No reservation can solve that.

Today's political class, between the ruling, opposition and coalition parties are all to blame for the higher educational status, which we are in. These parties do not have vision or mission or a plan of action in general in anything in life.

What the political class is saying and judiciary is echoing without asking any questions is that they are not worried if enough educational opportunities are available in India. They are not worried if interested people will be left out of higher education with or without reservation.

*********
If something as remote a sector as 'Telecom' could be linked to Country's development, why not 'education' be linked to Country's development..?

Which promotes the development of Country more directly..? Is it Higher Education..? or Is it Internet and Broadband..?

Since Higher Education is not of that shortage in developed nations and Telecom connectivity was, the Universal Service Obligations were defined for all members countries, which is now expanded to the entire world. Governments of the world have continuously allocated money to a fund called USO fund. In India, Telecom Operators contribute 5% of the revenues to USO fund. It stands at 9200+ crores today.

Government of India plans to spend this money on Telecom and Broadband offering 2Mbps speeds to users freely and for rural connectivity obligations. I have nothing against this also.

We need to simply understand that Higher Education Shortage is a much more serious problem in India than Telecom connectivity problem. Government of India should have created a ESO fund long back, which it should have utilized to provide higher education.

The Government of India started collecting Educational Cess for the last 2-3 years, many years after it started the USO fund. Till date, there is no visibility of the effects of fund anywhere.

In India, public spending on higher education is Rs.2,550 crores and government plans to take it to 6,354 crores in future.

At USD 400, per person spending on higher education is the least in India in the rapidly developing BRIC economies. China spends 2,728 USD, Russia spends 1,024 USD and Brazil spends 3,986 USD. For those who dream of India being a Superpower, the figure for US is USD 9,629, the United Kingdom USD 8,502 and Japan USD 4,830.

There has been a huge delay in recognizing the need of higher education. And now the government seems to be wasting the educational cess without knowing what to do with it.

We need to seriously reflect on why Telecom connectivity became so much a problem for India, when its primary and higher education status was much much worse compared to developed nations.

***********************

But we find government says things like inflation is a world-wide phenomena, there is no magic wand to solve the problem, higher education is a big financial burden and there is no magic wand to solve the problem etc..Then, what is the role of government to society..?

Ok. There is no magic wand today. Can the government state how the situation will be in 6 months, 1 year, 2 years and what is it doing towards achieving its objectives..?

It does not necessarily mean that Government of India needs to establish colleges and Universities in every place. It could be coming out with active and passive policies, which will aid proliferation of higher education opportunities. Such policies should actively rope in more private players with a very strict and independent regulator mechanism to monitor the quality and content of higher education. 

It needs a vision, drive and pulling in all people together. It needs that focus that was shown on such a figure as 'tele-density' to accelerate the sales of Nokia, Motorolla, Samsung, Sony Ericsson mobile phones in the Indian market.

But successive governments in India involving the same bureaucrats and politicians have demonstrated that unless investment from abroad are big enough for them to benefit, government does not move itself in any sector. They never bother to look at ways and means of raising internal resources and using it to optimum to develop the sector.

*********
If Higher Education involved powerful multi-national hardware vendors finding big business opportunities in India, then it would have got linked to everything in our life, from puberty to prosperity, like the magical 'tele-density' of the telecom equipment vendors. 

Then the bureaucrats, pundits and politicians would have 'understood' the greatness of higher education many times more. They would have 'felt' it. Otherwise, also we need not worry. We need to wait.

One day the big boys of Indian business will start countrywide educational institutions, as their margins everywhere else dips. Then reforms will flow through this sector and we will find ourselves preached daily on the importance of higher education by the same bureaucrats and politicians.

-TBT