The Sunday Story | Intellectual void: Faculty without diversity

Recently, the Union government revealed in parliament that 80% of faculty positions reserved under the other backward class (OBC) category, about 83% in the Scheduled Tribes (ST) category and around 64% in the Scheduled Caste (SC) category remain vacant in central universities. These vacancies reflect the discrimination and inequality that linger on in our societies and institutions even 75 years after independence. They also point out how our classrooms remain intellectually unaware of the social, economic and cultural diversity that exists in our society.

In 2024, a Parliamentary Committee had observed that SC/ST candidates were not hired in public institutions due to biased assessment by selection committees. A 2019 data provided to Parliament stated that Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) had only 2.5% SC faculty members, as against 15% reservation for SCs, 7.5% for STs and 27% for OBCs.

In 2020, a committee headed by the then IIT Delhi Director V Ramgopal Rao recommended exemption from reservations for faculty appointments in IITs. In January 2024, the University Grants Commission proposed to have provision for de-reservation of academic positions within higher education institutions (HEIs) in its draft policy, which was later withdrawn.

The revelation, therefore, that the majority of SC, ST and OBC seats are vacant in HEI should not come as a surprise. This pattern is not new, it was reported in 2010 that around half of the seats meant for SCs and STs were vacant in central universities.

Historically, there has been an exclusionary approach towards making members of historically disadvantaged caste groups part of academia in many top institutes. Ever since independence, there is hardly any moment when HEIs are proactively receptive towards the inclusion of these segments of population. This exclusion could be due to two factors: The fear of rupturing dominant social groups’ control over knowledge production or the unease about the possibility of redefining the character of intellectual discourse.

Having failed to become spaces that could contribute to the “annihilation of caste”, HEIs have always reproduced the social and economic inequalities present in society. The realities of society – the oppressions and discriminations - get reflected inside these institutions. There are instances of Dalit faculty members being attacked due to their caste identity or for seeking social justice and rights. 

Studies also show that caste-based conflicts are quite common even in top institutions of learning. While an RTI-based report from Hyderabad Central University in 2023 revealed discrimination in PhD admissions, the central government, in a response at the Rajya Sabha, said that between 2018-2023, nearly 19,000 SC, ST and OBC students dropped out of central HEIs.

On the other hand, Dalit students’ everyday experiences are determined by their social identity – in classrooms, outside classrooms, and in interactions with different sections of institutions. Unfortunately, caste discrimination expressed through embodied interactions, language usage, subtle remarks, humour has normalised the violence of exclusion in society.

French sociologist and public intellectual Pierre Bourdieu showed how the education system reproduces and perpetuates social structures. On account of their location within social structures, students from privileged backgrounds are endowed with the cultural capital, such as language skills, access to a variety of tools, which are valued in traditional educational systems. Those from disadvantaged backgrounds do not possess this cultural capital, which puts them at a disadvantage when they enter institutions. The system should be sensitive enough to value their experiences and knowledge systems, and enable them to integrate into the mainstream education system. 

The same holds true for faculty members as well. One can see the vast difference in experiences and opportunities between those who come from privileged and non-privileged backgrounds. Unfortunately, the hiring or evaluation criterion for jobs and promotions in HEIs are not sensitive to these complexities and, at the end, cater to the advantage of the privileged sections. 

Networks of exclusion

Bourdieu takes it further and shows how hidden curriculum, underlying tones of the pedagogy and symbolic violence become significant components in social reproduction within the HEIs. It is apparent that the presence of disadvantaged communities within the institutions is minimal. If these sections enter the institutions, Dalit feminist scholar Sharmila Rege argued, they pose challenges to “the social homogeneity of the classroom, boards of studies and other academic bodies” and it does lead to “obvious frictions”. At the same time, it also creates conditions for debates on “the nexus of networks of exclusion that operate formally and informally on campuses to reproduce caste inequalities in the metropolitan university.”

Sharmila Rege worked extensively on devising diverse pedagogical practices for university classrooms and wrote that “at the level of practice, for those of us who have been complicit in the power and privileges of caste, one of the first realisations is our lack of knowledge of cultures that have been violently marginalised." The knowledge and skills imparted risk being incomplete and disconnected from the real world if the diversity of society is not represented in the institutions of learning. 

Our societies carry historical and divisive biases based on caste and the absence of some sections of society in HEI has repercussions for teaching-learning processes. Their exclusion keeps a major social, economic and cultural reality out of academic and intellectual imagination. However, this is rarely discussed even in present debates around unfilled vacancies within HEIs. 

Ushering in diversity into an educational setting, particularly in the classroom, offers students a more realistic view of society by introducing them to different perspectives and experiences that are generally hidden in privileged and protected environments. Without this exposure, students might develop linear and simple thought processes and find it difficult to grasp social complexities.

Research shows that intellectual enhancement, leadership abilities and critical thinking processes emerge from classrooms which are diverse. Ironically, there are proposals to de-emphasise caste-related topics in university courses and to drop themes like caste discrimination, misogyny, prejudice etc. 

The unfilled vacancies in HEIs should be seen in light of what it does to the intellectual and cognitive landscape. Only then would it create a commitment to have candidates from disadvantaged backgrounds in the institutions and generate a proactive engagement with them. This will help perceive social exclusion, generally seen in physical terms, through its impact on knowledge production and the normalisation of a hierarchical, unequal and discriminatory social order.

(Ravi Kumar is Director, Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning, South Asian University)