Explained | Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill aims to create single higher education regulator

New Delhi: The Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill which seeks to set up an overarching higher education commission was introduced in Lok Sabha on Monday.

Here is an explainer on the Bill:

1. What has the Bill proposed?

The Bill proposes setting up an overarching higher education commission along with three councils for regulation, accreditation and ensuring academic standards for universities and higher education institutions (HEI) in India.

2. Which institutions will be covered under the commission?

The commission will cover all central universities and colleges under it, institutes of national importance functioning under the administrative purview of the Ministry of Education including IITs, NITs, IISc, IISERs, IIMs, and IIITs.

3. What will be composition?

The commission will be headed by a chairperson appointed by the President of India. Besides the chairperson, there will be 12 members who will also be appointed by the President.

Each of the three councils will be headed by the respective presidents, who shall be a professor with at least 10 years of experience. The presidents will be appointed for an initial period of three years, extendable up to five years.

The councils will have 14 members. Both the president and members of the council, except for ex-officio members and member-secretary, will also be appointed by the President of India on the recommendation of a search-cum-selection committee of the central government. The President of India will have the power to remove the chairperson, president of different councils and its members in case of dereliction of duty.

4. What happens at present?

The UGC regulates non-technical higher-education institutions, the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) oversees technical education, and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) regulates teacher education. The Bill proposes to repeal these three agencies.

5. Councils and their proposed role:

The three councils have been named the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Viniyaman Parishad (regulatory council), the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Gunvatta Parishad (accreditation council) and the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Manak Parishad (standards council).

The regulatory council will operate as common regulator for higher education in India, while the accreditation council will be an accrediting body to supervise and oversee an independent ecosystem of accreditation. The standards council will take all such steps it thinks fit for the determination of academic standards in HEIs.

6. Funding:

It is proposed to keep the funding to the centrally funded higher educational institutes out of the purview of the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan. The National Education Policy, 2020 also envisions that the function of funding should be segregated from the councils performing the functions of academic standard setting, regulation and accreditation.

Thus, to ensure that the Standards Council, Regulatory Council and the Accreditation Council fully discharge their specific domain functions, the function of disbursal of grants to the centrally funded higher educational institutions shall be accordingly ensured through mechanisms devised by the Ministry of Education.