Mar 3, 2009 
New Delhi (PTI): A high-level committee has asked for the setting up of an apex body to design educational programmes focused on amalgamating various fields into one specific course, a proposal that could change the face of higher education in the country if implemented.
The special agency is likely to design courses and frame regulations that will allow flexibility to students to go beyond boundary of any specific discipline and learn thing from various domains.
“This approach will promote creativity among students. If you confine students to one specific domain, then his or her creativity is affected to a large extent,” a member of the committee told PTI here.
The committee, set up by HRD Ministry on Feb 28 last year and headed by former UGC chairman Prof Yash Pal, will submit its report to the ministry in a couple of days, he said.
The panel, whose one year term ended yesterday, was formed to suggest ways for restructuring higher education in the country. It is going to suggest that regulatory bodies like the UGC and the AICTE should be stripped off certain functions, which should be entrusted to the new agency.
“The creativity of students is affected largely by the existing system as we put different subjects like engineering, social science, science, business studies and medicine in different domain and do not allow students to go beyond the domain,” he said.
The National Knowledge Commission (NKC) had earlier made a similar proposal in which it suggested for creating a Higher Education Authority.
“But our argument is different from that of the NKC. We want the special agency to design the courses in a fashion that will help an engineering student learn something about medicine. Similarly, a student of humanities can know theories of bio-technology,” the member said.
The committee is in favour of allowing IITs to expand its domain from engineering to various areas like medicine, business studies, social science etc.
The member gave the example of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) which was started as an engineering college. Later it spread the areas of studies into many subjects, including economics.
“Similarly the IITs can expand. They may change their names but they should touch different areas,” he said.
Regarding functioning of central universities, the committee is of the view that these institutions should start under-graduate courses in their campuses.
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