India Today – August 13, 2018

50 INDIA TODAY AUGUST 13, 2018

and importance of practical skills.
Mendel could never have produced
those deep insights that have led to
the field of genetics and which have
altered the course of mankind had he
not been well versed in gardening and
had he not used knowledge streams
like mathematics and botany together.
Very few of us realise that Einstein was
a skilled craftsman with more than a
hundred inventions and patents to his
credit, including the automatic camera
and a unique refrigerator. This was
also true of Newton, Kabir, Faraday
and Archimedes. In recent times,
search engine Google is nothing but a
practical invention for efficient gather-
ing of information through the web.

It combines mathematical knowledge
with skilled programming. It is not as
if India has been blissfully unaware
of what needs to be done. We have
had such great souls as Tagore and
Gandhi strongly emphasising the use
of the hands and creating connections
between knowledge and the real world.
So what is the message that needs
must be inferred? The most important
lesson is that skills are to be recognised
and embedded in learning pro-
grammes for true and good education.
Does that happen in our institutions
of higher education in India? The
answer is a resounding no! Not even
in the famed IITs as such. Our most
pressing prescription is targeted at the
universities and colleges of the nation.

Their learning programmes are largely

imparting a mostly irrelevant body of

knowledge through the blackboard.

Graduates from these institutions fail

to acquire any skills or ability to merge

skills and knowledge in meaningful

ways. As an illustration, an important

subject within mathematics, known

as fluid dynamics, is taught in almost

every credible college mathemat-

ics programme. Its students remain

largely unaware of its role in the design

of aircraft. Is it any wonder then that

India does not shine as a manufacturer

of aircraft?

Here’s an even more basic need,

which is enormously pressing.

Students in most institutions lack

basic communication, analytical and

critical thinking skills. Our experi-

ence demonstrates that they lack the

ability to think in rigorous ways about

most matters. Lest an impression is

created that this inability is largely

because of their unfamiliarity with

the English language, beware! Even

in the cow belt, these young and surely

talented minds do not display these

above-mentioned skills through the

Hindi language as well. Now try and

fit into their educational make-up the

crying need to have the so very impor-

tant skills of acquiring and analysing

data and blending it with creative

coding for all kinds of applications.

Are we then surprised that not a

single computer language has been

invented in India? It is only when our

young minds are exposed to the joys

and merits of critical thinking and

applicable knowledge will they really

become innovative in their approach

to acquiring skills-based knowledge

and in using it to advantage.

T

he numbers of students at-

tending colleges have been

consistently going up. The gross

enrolment ratio in tertiary

education had risen to 24.5 per cent

in 2015-16, according to NITI Aayog.

However, look at the challenges facing

engineering graduates. A survey of

150,000 engineers found only 4 per

cent were employable in engineering

start-up roles. Catch any educational

institution that has included a credit

system that also recognises such en-

trepreneurship. The duality between

formal education and skilling has to

go. So what are the basic skills that

our colleges and universities should be

imparting and what could be the role

of the government in it? Essentially,

the sooner the government defangs

the regulatory bodies the better.

These bodies must be freed from the

clutches of unimaginative bureau-

cratic control. This will then allow

colleges/ universities to experiment in

bold ways so that they foster innova-

tive learning that combines knowl-

edge and skills to tackle the challenges

of the nation. As regards the requisite

skills, they are the ability to work in

groups, to have good communication

and analytical skills, to be adept at

using digital technology and have the

skills to critically handle information

and data. These must be embedded

in the learning of every discipline and

in any case the learning must be in

a trans-disciplinary fashion. This is

quite easy to implement. n

Dinesh Singh is former vice-chancellor,

University of Delhi, and a distinguished

academic consultant with Middlesex

University, London; Amogh Rai is a

research fellow in economics at SGT

University, Gurugram

Five years ago, Delhi University invited a

leading MNC for campus placement. The firm

needed graduates with good communication and

analytical skills. Only three made the cut

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