Prof. HS Ballal, Chairman, FICCI Higher Education Committee and Pro-Chancellor of Manipal University while speaking at the inaugural session of FICCI Higher Education Summit 2009 at New Delhi, called for the government to take steps to make higher education all inclusive and affordable for the masses.

“No country can think of making much headway without having a good higher education system. Our country is home to 540 million people under the age of 30. By next year, 19 per cent of our population, an estimated 235 million will be in the higher education group. But the present scenario in the country is not as bright as it should be; considering the fact that we, after China and the United States are the biggest higher education providers in the world.”

He said at present, only 12 per cent of the students who complete secondary education enroll for higher education. And lamented those figures were nowhere near the 70 per cent enrolment in some developed countries. Worse, it was also much lower than the figure of 20 per cent in some Southeast Asian countries. "We must increase this proportion," he said emphatically.

One reason, perhaps a very important one, why the present gross enrollment ratio (GER) in the country stands at about 12 is because of the inadequate preparation of students while in secondary education stage. There is poor alignment between secondary and higher education and a lack of information on where and how to get to higher education institutions, which course to pursue and so on.

“That barrier needs to be eliminated and every student needs to be enlightened about post-secondary education. That is where the departments involved in these two educations need to collaborate to build college aspirations among our students. Which means as soon as they are out of secondary education, they are prepared to take the first step towards their career. On the positive side, the government hopes to have 15 per cent enrollment in the 11th plan period (2007-12),” he said.

Prof. Ballal further added, “In India only a meager 20 percent of Higher Education Institutes are located in the 'rural' India which is home to more than 65 percent of our population. The remaining 80 percent of Institutions are located in Urban or Semi-Urban areas which make up for only 30 to 35 percent of India today. The National Knowledge Commission has projected the need for 1500 Universities, but a recent more pragmatic approach of having atleast one University for each district in India needs to be paid due attention.”

On the issue of affordability Prof. Ballal said, “Access to post-secondary education is possible only when students can afford to attend college. Affordability is as much a consideration as any other factor. Perhaps, it means taking into consideration the weaker and underprivileged sections of our society. For many students in India, paying for college requires a combination of family contributions and some financial aid, may be a student's loan. Many of the problems involving higher education are rooted in the lack of resources. And because a whole lot of them depend on loans, it should be made easily available. No student should be denied access to education due to lack of resources. Banks can come out with better schemes and offers and publicize them. Meritrocracy needs to be honoured and scholarships must be set aside for meritorious students.”

Prof. Ballal also provided some suggestions to the government for improving funding, “There is some encouragement from the government when it raised the allocation for the sector. The higher education budget for the current fiscal has been pegged at Rs 15,429 crores, including a planned allocation of Rs 9,600 crore. During the last financial year the total allocation was Rs 11,340 crores. On a more positive note, the finance minister while presenting the budget said the government has a mandate to increase education budget to six per cent of the GDP. That augurs well for higher education in the country. The global verage expenditure on Education is 4.5% of GDP. Developing nations are spending 4.4% of their GDP on education whereas we in India spend only 3.6% of our GDP on education. In 1986 according to the Govt's National Policy on Education, the target was 6% of GDP to be spent on Education. From the fund allocated for education, only 19% is being spent on Higher Education and this is stagnant from last 3-4 years. Though public expenditure on education has increased, money spent by Govt. on Higher Education comes to only 0.7% of the GDP, (reduced percentage allocation from previous outlays - 0.77 % in 1991). The present Govt has increased expenditure on higher Education by nine-fold. Even after such a massive increase in public investment when we take into consideration only the Government's new initiatives of establishing central universities, colleges in low GER districts, IITs, IIMs, NITs, IIITs, IISER, SPAs and Centres for training and research, the required resource gap identified by Planning Commission, Government of India is Rs 2.22 Trillion.”

On the important issue of quality in education, he said, “A major problem that we face is in the quality of higher education that our institutions impart. Unfortunately, most of them produce pass-outs who are nowhere near international standards. The quality of knowledge generated in higher education institutions is becoming increasingly important. It poses a serious challenge to our country specially now, at a time when we are poised to grow considerably over the next few years. Responding to this demand without further diluting the quality will be a daunting task. This sudden growth could also entail a serious problem, that of finding faculty who can contribute gainfully to the system. Taking advantage of technology to overcome lack of enough good faculty can be one way of ensuring that our standards do not drop with the expansion.”