Opinion Decentralised destiny

We have to recognise that the one institution that is central to the working of universities and institutes is the Executive Council — the EC — or an equivalent board. It is these institutions that are the most politicised,even more than the VC’s office. The sources of politicisation are both external and internal; externally because of government nominations; internally because of the political links of teacher representatives. More than the VC,the quality and composition of these councils matter to the university. These need to be radically depoliticised.

The Indian system is bizarre in that the EC,the main body that enforces accountability,doesn’t own the appointment of the institution’s head. In fact in well-run institutions two conditions are necessary: that the board be of high quality,and that it be broadly aligned with the chief executive’s vision. For the latter to happen,there has to be some direct board involvement in selection. Of course,the current composition of these boards is the source of the problem. A real innovation would be to rethink their size,composition and function.

The most peculiar feature of the appointment of VCs is that the appointing committees know almost nothing about the universities they are making appointments to. While some of them will loosely canvass names,none of them makes determinations about the kind of person a particular university needs at a particular juncture. There is also no mechanism for conversations with candidates about ideas they would bring to improve a particular university. This kind of conversation cannot be captured through the idea of an interview. It is more about discussing challenges a particular university faces. In some ways the risk is that centralised collegia will continue to exacerbate these distances and gaps of knowledge between the board and the appointee,between the selection committee and the university. In most successful universities outside India,it is the board-equivalent that is central to the appointments process and an ongoing conversation about the direction of the university.

In some ways,none of this mattered much because we had homogenised our university system so much. The vice-chancellor operated within a fixed set of rules on everything ranging from appointments to fund rising,to degree structures,to budget constraints. Very occasionally a VC would break the mould with a certain degree of improvised crashing at the gates,but these innovations would usually not outlast their tenure. The crucial challenge for the Indian system is to inculcate more institutional diversity,experimentation,and the ability of institutions to evolve their own character,to compete and make judgment calls about where to head next. Instead,much of the talk is about greater standardisation of the system. We want everything centralised,from admissions criteria to appointments. In some ways creating a centralised mechanism for the selection of vice-chancellors is of a piece with what is referred to as the “UPSCisation” of academic life.

It is fundamentally also a symptom of the fact that the one thing we do not really want to contemplate is giving universities charge of their own destiny. In our conception there must always be a body unconnected with the university to make so many of the key decisions that define the university’s character. There is also another fallacy implicit in this centralisation model: the fallacy of a quick fix. If Indian public universities are to be reclaimed they will have to be reclaimed one institution at a time,each with its own set of challenges. It will require the hard labour,not just of appointing VCs,but of ensuring that all bodies that enforce accountability in the system have their ideas aligned.

The one final thing that helped ruin the Indian system was the rise of the professional education bureaucrat. In some ways this would not be a bad thing: the skills required to run an institution are different from professorial skills,and you need both personality types. But in field after field,a small group of academics exercised inordinate power in committee after committee as gatekeepers of academic and institutional wisdom. And eminence was no guarantee of the manner in which power would be exercised.

While its exact composition is not known,a single centralised committee runs exactly this same risk of empowering a super-class of people; except that this group will now control a larger number of universities all at once. Concentration of power ought usually to be an object of suspicion; in the case of universities even more so. In principle,there will be one collegium for Central universities and states can have their own parallel structures. In all likelihood,particularly at the state level,this will merely shift the locus of politicisation to a different level; now it will be at the level of nomination to a colleguim rather than appointment of the VC. But it might also have the unintended consequence of concentrating even more academic power.

Restoring vitality to the university system requires that each university have a distinct sense of its identity,it has autonomy in that its functionaries take charge of key decisions,and it sees itself in competition for excellence with other universities. Centralising appointments of VCs is a bit like giving a country sovereignty only on the condition that its rulers be appointed from outside. If we want really radical reform,we should decentralise appointments and let responsible authorities in universities take charge of their own destiny.

The writer is president,Centre for Policy Research,Delhi

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