The growth, development, and quality of a nation’s institutions of higher education are key indicators of its modernisation and development.  Goa’s higher education needs to reinvent  to fulfill the present day requirements and provide competitive advantage to students of Goa. Goa’s higher education is dominated and controlled primarily by two regulatory bodies, the Directorate of Higher education of the Government of Goa and the Goa University. Though both these authorities have a pivotal role to guide Goa’s higher education they have limited their function to merely that of a controlling and regulating authority instead of becoming an enabling body thus curtailing and restricting growth and excellence of Goa’s higher education.

 The first of these, i.e. the Directorate of Higher Education has two or three  major functions, first , the  granting of ‘No objection’ for setting  up of  higher education Institutions or  permitting  existing Institutions to begin new progammes or courses. To fulfill this function (in an era of knowledge explosion) no guidelines are notified, no committee for scrutiny has ever been  announced, it is all subjective  often decisions are made by the Directorate as per the dictates  of the concerned minister. Political or personal considerations rather than  any  objective criteria  seems to  dominate such decision making,  rather than any   predetermined policy. In the absence of a predetermined and publicised policy, permissions for  new courses or Institutions are  not only haphazard but  very subjective. 

The second major role of the Directorate of Higher Education is the function of regulating grant in aid. Prior to 2000 all the higher education Institutions in Goa were  covered under the ‘Grant in aid’ scheme but  thereafter as  the demand for new quality and job-oriented courses increased, instead of promoting  quality and variety in higher education, the Government and the Directorate only sought to restrict  higher education, by having recourse to   the “self-financing  mode”. A system  which greatly affected the quality  of education. This was an act of escapism by the Government  of Goa, that instead of finding ways and means to effectively make use of demands for new courses, the government used the opportunity to shed its responsibility and  at the same time attempted to control higher education. 

The fact that post 2000,  the Government  of Goa extended grant-in-aid to certain selected  new institutions purely on political or personal  considerations  is an undisputed fact, as no policy was announced  and no objective criteria were laid down thus  ignoring some  of the  older  Institutions/ courses. Unfortunately in Goa, ‘Grant-in-aid’  has come to be understood as distribution of government’s largesse, to whom so ever the  Minister/department favors, thus undermining the role  and responsibility of the government in Higher education. This misconception is because of the failure to comprehend its responsibility towards the children of the State.  The Goa Government has failed to alter its policy in keeping with this  idea of Right to Education as a fundamental right . 

Right to education is a right available to those who seek higher education and certainly not the right of management of  Institutions of higher education to seek government support. Instead of funding the institution (which of course the government considers a favour to the management), the government should fund children’s education.

 How can it be done effectively? The government should determine the cost of education for each child, for each of the courses. There are well accepted methods to determine the standard unit cost of education for each of the courses. Then the government should take a well considered policy decision as to what part of this unit cost  the  Government will bear ( i.e. depending on its capacity as the Supreme Court mentioned). There after the amount  so determined should be provided as student’s free ships or scholarship by categorising the students  as, students domiciled in the State. For students for other states and students from outside India and the scholarships or free ships  should be accordingly modified so that the burden does not fall on the State. Such scholarships should be channelised through the Institution and to the Institution in such a way that the Government aid to an Institution directly depends on the number of students enrolled for each of the courses.  The balance amount of such cost being payable  as tuition fees. Such a system will eliminate the present anomaly, where there are institutions with less students and more faculty, thus getting more government funding and there are also Institutions with more students but with less faculty getting lesser funding. 

The distinction between grant in aid courses and self-financing courses should be done away with, which is grossly discriminatory and violative of Article 14 (right to equality) of the Constitution of India. The colleges should manage their expenses including salary of teachers and staff from such funds received as scholarships of students and the tuition fees. Surplus any could be carried forward for subsequent years by a system of reserve funds. This way students will have the choice to choose between courses and between Institutions. Institutions which provide the most wanted courses and best quality education will certainly thrive and do better, thus paving the way for excellence.

 Institutions which are able to cater to students needs and preferences, will have better qualified faculty and facilities, but those who fail to live up to students needs and expectations will have to close down. This way the Government could promote support and encourage excellence in Education. Of course in those cases where access to education (eg. rural areas) are considered a priority, Government could   provide additional support to such institutions, which should always be a temporary measure. The system would thus become transparent and the evils of favoritism and partiality  which are the hallmarks of the present system of ‘Grant-in-aid’ would come to an end.

(The writer is a Professor of Law and former Dean, Faculty of Law, Goa University.)