Islamabad: Setting an example for other South Asian nations, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has taken steps to allow the world’s leading universities — Oxford, Stanford, and Yale — to open their campuses in India.
India’s University Grants Commission (UGC) Thursday unveiled a draft for public feedback to allow the leading foreign universities to operate by opening their campuses in the country home to more than 1.4 billion people.
The draft proposes that it is up to the campuses to decide on admission criteria for domestic and foreign students, fee structure, and scholarships. However, the institutions will have the autonomy to recruit faculty and staff.
The step has come as an attempt to rebuild the country’s higher education system, which, despite giving many CEOs to the world’s leading companies like Microsoft and Alphabet Inc (Google), fare poorly in global rankings.
In the Global Talent Competitiveness Index of 2022, India ranked 101 among 133 nations, followed by other South Asian countries like Pakistan, Nepal, and Bangladesh.
Modi’s government is pushing to revamp the country’s heavily-regulated education sector to enable Indian students to obtain foreign qualifications at an affordable cost and make India an attractive global study destination.
