Sustaining Academic Excellence Position Paper by IIMA Faculty

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Sustaining Academic ExcellencePosition Paper
by IIMA Faculty

• April 2, 2004

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Autonomy and Excellence

• Functional autonomy is essential for IIMs, if
  they are to retain and enhance their capacity for
  Excellence
• Such functional autonomy is not possible without
  financial independence

Ministry of Human Resource Development, Govt. of
India, Report and Recommendation of the Committee
to Review the functioning of IIMs (Kurien
Committee) July 1992
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What is functional autonomy?

• Academic Autonomy Freedom to choose mix of
  activities, courseware, method of instruction,
  external teaching resources
• Institutional Autonomy Freedom to decide
  framework and structure for decision making
  processes, internal governance system
• Administrative Autonomy Board Society for
  policy guidelines, encompasses full freedom in
  recruitment
• Financial Autonomy Freedom to raise resources
  and decide items of expenditure, kind of
  infrastructure to be created, User charges to be
  levied, eg. IAS programmes, 3i-network

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Has autonomy got dented?

• Ministry changing selection process of the
  Directors of IIMs
• Ministry canceling the CAT test unilaterally
• Ministry putting pressure on the IIMA to sign a
  MoU containing restrictive clauses
• Ministry claiming a veto power on the efforts of
  the Institute to extend its geographical reach

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Has autonomy got dented?

• Ministry attempting to reduce the corpus of the
  Institute
• Ministry ordering that fee be set at Rs. 30,000
  without going through the steps of time-honoured
  consultative process and unilaterally shutting
  doors for alternate ways to achieve the intended
  social objective
• Ministry officials threatening dismissal of
  members of Society, Board, and Director
• Ministry claiming that IIMs should manage with
  lower number of teachers without taking into
  account its impact on activity mix and quality of
  our educational programmes

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Heart of the ControversyFee Cut Order

• MHRD and honorable Ministers objective
• We honour the objective and faculty would like to
  assure that it will do its best to achieve the
  objective
• In total congruence
• Absolutely no difference in views

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Then what is the problem?

• Fundamental problem to be addressed is What
  should be the fee of management education so that
  it becomes accessible to economically weaker
  section of the society
• If problem seems to be complex, apply the
  principle of breaking into sub-problems
• (a) What should be the fee of management
  education?
• (b) Given above fee, how it can be made
  accessible to weaker section of the society

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Another solution to achieve the same objective

• (a) What should be the fee?
• Fee should be on the basis of costs (in line with
  the principle laid down by TMA Pai case)
• Our costs are Rs. 2.8 lakhs
• How does our fees compare with others (eg. ISB)
• (b) Given above fee, how can it be made
  accessible to economically weaker section of
  society
• Through Scholarships

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Does IIMA have Scholarships?

• CAT Bulletin
• Lady student about to return home for lack of
  funds, daughter of a school teacher in tribal
  area of north eastern state, 2003 batch
• Son of a single parent working as dishwasher and
  floor cleaner
• Scholarship for what all items
• Stitching a suite, home travel, laundry, phone
  calls
• Excellent examples of what Autonomy can do to
  providing Scholarships

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Are these stray incidences?

• Let us look at data of last 20 years

Item 1983-84 2003-04
PGP fee (including hostel charges) 3,000 1,50,000
Low Income Group 20 18
Middle Income Group 58 60
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Is providing scholarship at variance from Govt.
Policypronouncements in last 10-15 years?
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Current Govt.s Thinking(as per Vision Document
2004)

• Making quality education affordable to a
  common Indian family. No student should be
  deprived of access to higher education for lack
  of resources. Hence, scholarship and soft loans
  should be made widely available.

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Then what is the issue?

• Perhaps we have not communicated properly to MHRD
  that we are in total agreement on the objective
  but differ in our understanding on what is an
  appropriate solution to fulfill the objective
• Perhaps consultative process has not been taken
  forward
• Perhaps we have failed in adequately
  communicating and sensitizing MHRD about our
  governance decision making processes evolved
  over several years
• May be we missed experimenting with Jadoo ki
  Jhappi!
• We perhaps need to strengthen the scholarship
  scheme and give it a wide publicity

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Institutes Mission and Objectives

• Meet the demand for managerial talent to support
  the growing Indian Economy
• Support the globalization of the Indian economy
• Contribute to the development and governance
• Build world class infrastructure
• Reduce the financial burden on govt.

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Conclusions

• Autonomy and financial independence key elements
  for our growth and excellence
• Accountability Performance, obeying financial
  norms and delivering on social commitments
• Top 50 achievements of Independent India
• Feel sad, hurt, demoralized when pillars of our
  foundation, namely autonomy and supportive stance
  of govt., are shaking
• Also feel shocked and surprised when all policy
  pronouncements, in last 10-15 years, suggest that
  Govt. wants to take autonomy to its next orbit

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Current Govt.s Thinking(as per Vision Document
2004)

• De-bureacratising the administration of our
  educational institutions
• Autonomy to centers of excellence
• Empowering teachers
• And maximizing community participation

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Thank You!