22 July 2019 OutlOOk 51
Tamil Nadu is one state
where enough emphasis is
put on quality of education.
The colleges and students
both place high importance
on research and innovation.
Can you explain the latest
progress in this direction?
The State is encouraging research and
innovation programmes at all levels.
PG Degree colleges are also
facilitated to do research activities.
Recently a huge grant was sanctioned
by Ministry of Human Resource
Development (MHRD) to State
Universities under RUSA schemes.
In Phase-1, Rs.200 crore was
sanctioned to 10 Universities to
upgrade basic infrastructure. In
Phase-2, Rs.400 crore has been
approved for research and
innovation.
How does Tamil Nadu
higher education board
work in tandem with
Ministry of Human Resource
Development? What is
MHRD’s contribution to
education in State?
MHRD has been providing liberal
financial grants and critical policy
support to the state. For example,
MHRD has almost doubled our
grants under centrally supported
schemes. To suppliment these efforts,
Rs.200 Crore for construction of
additional class rooms and labs in 62
government colleges was provided by
State Government.
How does the state
government work with
NAAC to grant funds, since
the idea is to ensure
quality of institutions? B)
How does NAAC
accreditation work in the
state?
• Above 500 institutions in our
state are NAAC accredited and
rest of the institutions are also
under NAAC accreditation
process.• Acquiring valid NAAC is
mandatory to receive grant
under RUSA schemes. We have
encouraged the Institutions to
apply early and improve the
grading. Government is alsoproviding some financial
incentive in this regard.• The institutions who fulfil the
requirements and standards
prescribed by the NAAC will be
accredited. Hence the
accredited colleges can render
quality graduates to country.What is the role of higher
education council in a
state, especially in the
state of Tamil Nadu?The main function of TANSCHE is
“to coordinate and determine
standards in institutions for higher
education or research and in
scientific and technical institutions,
in accordance with the guidelines
issued by the University Grants
Commission, from time to time.
The Council has been providing
excellent support by framing
syllabus and for equivalence of
degrees”.The state has several
universities with multiple
campus. How feasible is it
to run such campuses?
It is a great challenge for the
government to facilitate & co-
ordinate activities of large number
of universities. It also has an
onerous task of running a multi-
disciplinary University which has
engineering, medical & arts and
science stream. However, this is a
good model to be replicated in
future.It is known that Tamil
Nadu places high
emphasis on quality of
education. The state has
model syllabi. Can you
elaborate on the efforts
higher education
department takes to
maintain top quality?
State Integrated Board of Syllabus
(SIBOS) is the Board which
formulates standard syllabi on par
with UGC recommended syllabi.
The board of studies chairman of
each subject from all state
universities collaborate to arrive at
the standard syllabi. This brings
uniformity in syllabi while
providing enough space for recent
trends in each area which
preserves the autonomy of the
institutions.
SIBOS formulated syllabi helps
in the migration of students from
one university to another
university during the course of
their study. These is also useful to
settle the equivalence related
issues.Alagappa university Rs. 100 crore
Anna university Rs. 50 crore
Annamalai university Rs. 50 crore
Bharathidasan university Rs. 50 crore
Bharathiyar university Rs. 50 crore
Madurai Kamaraj university Rs. 50 crore
Madras university Rs. 50 croreThe STaTe iS encouraging
reSearch and innovaTion
programmeS aT all levelS.
pg degree collegeS are
alSo faciliTaTed To do
reSearch acTiviTieS.
recenTly a huge Sum of
granT waS SancTioned by
mhrd To STaTe univerSiTieS
under ruSa SchemeS.