14 Innovation Universities to be at par with ISRO, BARC, AEC

With an aim of boosting the much needed research, the government intends to give special privilege to the proposed 14 Innovation Universities that will give them autonomy and exemption from CAG audit, bringing them at par with ISRO, BARC and Atomic Energy Commission.

Expenditure on teaching and research by the Innovation Universities, which are proposed to be set up during the 11th Plan period, would be kept out of the scrutiny of Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), a final concept note prepared by the HRD Ministry said.

At present, a few elite institutes like Bhaba Atomic Research Centre, Atomic Energy Commission and Indian Space Research Organisation are exempted from CAG scrutiny.

However, the exemption will not extend to expenditure on administration and non-academic areas. Accountability will be ensured by two peer groups -- one for research and another for course work and teaching, it said. These provisions are aimed at encouraging research and teaching activities in the universities. India has been lagging behind other countries in the area of research. While 4,700 professionals per a million people are engaged in research in developed countries, the number of such researchers is 156 in India.

These universities will follow multi-disciplinary approach in designing courses.

Different faculties in such universities will enjoy the freedom to decide the intake and course structure. The faculty board shall have the freedom to prescribe fee structure for the under-graduate programmes while the university will decide fee for PG courses.

The university shall offer scholarship to 20 per cent of students at under-graduate and post-graduate levels. At the doctorate level, all the students should be awarded fellowships, the concept note said.

The institutions will enjoy autonomy in matters of academics, faculty personnel, finances and administration.

Universities will have the freedom to define their own appointment criteria. This includes, appointment by invitation to academics of eminence.

A University Finance Commission consisting of eminent academicians preferably Nobel laureates and selected national research professors and experts could work out criterion for provisioning per-student expenditure for these universities.