4 years of Modi government: India on track to become 'Human Resources Capital'

The Modi government completed four years on May 26. PM Modi envisioned that India can become the human resources capital of the world. "If China has emerged as the manufacturing capital of the world, India can become the human resources capital of the world," the PM said while launching the 'Skill India Mission' in 2015. In this direction, the Human Resouce Development Ministry launched various scholarship schemes, higher education institutions and focused on promoting research and innovations in educational institutions.

UDAAN: This project was launched by CBSE in November 2014 under the guidance of Ministry of Human Resource Development. The Government aims to address the low enrolment of girl students in prestigious engineering institutions and the teaching gap between school education and engineering entrance examinations by addressing the three dimensions of education - curriculum design, transaction and assessment.

The project supports about 1000 selected meritorious girls from economically weaker section to prepare for the Engineering Examination while studying in class XI and XII. As a result they are able to compete confidently in the entrance examinations of technical education institutions and eventually become important stakeholders in the technical growth of the nation. Students were guided and assessed during online weekend classes held at 64 centers across the country on Saturdays and Sundays.

• ln the year 2017, 632 girls out of 777 (session 2016-17, class XII) appeared in JEE (Mains) and 135 qualified for JEE (Advanced).
• For the session 2017-18,1019 girls were enrolled for class XI while 516 girls continued from the previous year and were promoted to class XI.

National Means-cum-Merit Scholarship Scheme (NMMSS): In total, 3.81 lakh scholarshrps have been sanctioned during 2014-15 to 2016-17. In the year 2017-18 (as on 28.02 2018) 4.13 lakh scholarshrps have been sanctioned.

National Scheme of lncentive to Girls for Secondary Scholarship (NSIGSE): 9.71 lakh incentive to girls have been sanctioned during 2014-15 to 2016-17. 9.73 lakh incentives to girls have been sanctioned during the current year 2017-18 (as on 28.02 2018).

SARVA SHIKSHA ABHIYAN: Rs.22,500 Crore earmarked for this scheme in the budget. Under SSA. the Revised Estimate for 2016-17 was Rs 22500 crore out of which 96.35% was spent. The Revised Estimate for 2017-18 was allocated at Rs 23500 crore out of which 82.21% has been released as on 28 02.2018. The Budget Estimate for 2018-19 has been increased by 11.2% to Rs 26128.81 crore.

National Academic Depository (NAD): Launched in 2017 with objective to develop a Digital Depository for school learning certificates, degrees and other academic awards of Higher Education Institutions, on the pattern of a Securities Depository in line with the vision of Digital India. The NAD is born out of an initiative to provide an online 24X7 store-house of all academic awards, viz. certificates, diplomas, degrees, mark sheets etc. of School Education Boards and Higher Educational Institutions on the pattern of a security depository in line with the vision of digital India and help in safe storage, easy retrival and validating the authenticity of academic awards.

As on 16th February, 2018, around 91.03 lakhs academic awards have been lodged on NAD. About 330 academic institutions including School Boards have on-boarded NAD and about 30,000 students have already registered on NAD.

Swachch Vidyalaya:

• In response to the clarion call made by the Prime Minister on 15 August, 2014, the Department of School Education and Literacy launched the Swachh Vidyalaya lnitiative (SVI) for the construction and repair of separate toilets for girls and boys in every school within a year.
• The targets were fully achieved with 4,17,796 toilets added to 2,61,400 government elementary and secondary schools during the year from 15.8.2014 to 15.8.2015.
• This was achieved by a combination of effort from government, public and corporate sectors and private contributions. This includes schools in the most difficult to reach areas in the country such as districts facing Left Wing Extremism (LWE), in forests, remote mountainous terrain and in crowded slums. With this, all 13.77 crore children in 11.21 lakh government schools all over the country now have access to toilet facilities.

Scholarships: As per the record maintained by AICTE, a sum of Rs. 292.50 Crore (approx.) has been released to 11,862 GATE qualified M. Tech. students. In addition, Rs. 2.61 Lakh have been released under National Doctoral Fellowship Scheme. Overall, a sum of Rs. 1076 Crore have been released to GATE qualified M. Tech. Students in the last three year.

NEW IITs: Six new IITs at Jammu, Bhilai, Goa, Dharwad, Tirupati and Palakkad are fully functional. ISM Dhanbad has been converted into an IIT.

Indian Institutes of Science Education & Research (IISERs): On the recommendation of the Scientific Advisory Council to the then Prime Minister of India (SAC-PM), the Government of India initially established five Indian Institute of Science Education & Research (IISERs) at Pune (2006), Kolkata (2006), Mohali (2007), Bhopal (2008) and Thiruvanantha-puram (2008). IISERs are declared as the Institutes of National Importance (INI) under the National Institutes Technology, Science Education & Research (NITSER) Act, 2007, as amended from time to time and are governed by their respective Boards of Governors as per provisions of the Act.

IISERs are envisaged to carry out research in frontier areas of science and to provide quality science education at the undergraduate and postgraduate level. The central theme of the IISER is to integrate education with research so that under-graduate teaching as well as doctoral and post-doctoral research work, carried out in symbiosis. Students are encouraged to carry out research projects during the vacation periods in the first four years of their Masters programme in various research institutes outside IISER. In the fifth year the students are required to participate in a research seminar and also carry out a research project on which a thesis will have to be written.

Achievements:

• 2015: As a sequel to the Andhra Pradesh Re-organisation Act, 2014, bifurcating the then State of Andhra Pradesh to the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telengana, a new IISER was established at Tirupati in the residual State of Andhra Pradesh. IISER Tirupati has been functioning from its temporary / transit campus with effect from 10.08.2015.
• 2016: Similarly, consequent upon an announcement by the Union Finance Minister in his Budget speech (2015), another IISER was established at Berhampur, Odisha. IISER Berhampur is function-ing from its temporary / transit campus with effect from 01.08.2016. The Union Cabinet, it its meeting held on 27.10.2016, inter alia approved incorporation of the two IISERs Tirupati and Berhampur in the NITSER Act, 2007.
• 2017: Consequently, with the adoption of the NITSER (Amendment) Bill, 2017 in the Lok Sabha on 28.03.2017 and Rajya Sabha on 26.07.2017 and necessary notifications issued in the Gazette of India, the two new IISERs at Tirupati and Berhampur stood incorporated at Sl. Nos. 6 & 7 of the Second Schedule to the NITSER Act, 2007.

NEW IIMs: In the Budget speech 2014-15, six new IIMs were announced. Accordingly, during the year 2015-16, six more IIMs have been established at Amritsar (Punjab), Bodh Gaya (Bihar), Nagpur (Maharashtra), Sambalpur (Odisha), Sirmaur (Himachal Pradesh) and Vishakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh) and commenced their academic session from 2015-16 from temporary campuses. The Ministry of HRD is providing funds to establish the IIMs for academic activities and setting up of temporary campuses and construction of permanent campuses. A total of Rs.79 crore per institute has been approved for their establishment and operation from the temporary campus during initial years.

The Union Finance Minister, in his Budget Speech (2015) had inter alia announced setting up of an Indian Institute of Management (IIM) in the State of Jammu and Kashmir. Mentored by IIM Lucknow, IIM Jammu, has started its first academic session in 2016-17 with 54 students from Temporary / transit campus located at old Government College of Engineering & Technology (GCE&T), Canal Road, Jammu. An amount of Rs.61.9 crore per institute has been approved for its establishment and operation from the temporary campus during initial years.

Global Initiative of Academic Networks (GIAN): It was launched on 30th November, 2015. The programme seeks to invite distinguished academicians, entrepreneurs, scientists, experts from premier institutions from across the world, to teach in the higher educational institutions in India.

• No. of Courses approved till date: 1417
• Courses already organized: 1037
• No of host Institutions: 138

Study Webs of Active Learning for Young Aspiring Minds (SWAYAM): The Ministry of HRD has embarked on a major and new initiative called 'Study Webs of Active Learning for Young Aspiring Minds' (SWAYAM), which will provide one integrated platform and portal for online courses, using information and communication technology (ICT) and covering all higher education subjects and skill sector courses. Till date, more than 28 Lakhs learners have been enrolled in 1000+ MOOCs courses that have been run through SWAYAM.

National Digital Library (NDL): Under National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology, the HRD initiated the National Digital Library of India (NDL India) project to develop a framework of virtual repository of learning resources with a single-window search facility.

• 1.5 Crore e-books and documents are available.
• Content is available in English, Hindi and some other languages.
• There are 160 Content contributor. There are 30 lakh users
• 9 thousand educational institutions from where users registered.

NATIONAL RANKINGS FOR HIGHER INSTITUTIONS: National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) was launched to help Indian Educational Institutions to participate in the world rankings with greater confidence.

Under National Institutional Ranking Framework-2018, 2809 institutions have participated in nine categories. This includes 301 Universities, 906 Engineering Institutions, 487 Management Institutions, 286 Pharmacy Institutions, 71 Law Institutions, 101 Medical Institutions, 59 Architecture Institutions and 1087 General Degree Colleges.

"India Rankings 2018" have ranked institutions in the disciplines/categories mentioned above, and provided a common overall rank across all disciplines for those institutions, which have more than 1000 enrolled students.

Smart India Hackathon: This is a unique IT Initiative under which students are encouraged to apply knowledge to the real life situations and to find innovative solutions to the day to day problems. Smart India Hackathon 2018 (SIH 2018) was launched on 16th October 2017. It includes 2 sub-editions - Software as well as Hardware: Software Edition- 36-hour software product development competition, similar in concept to SIH 2017. In the new Hardware Edition of the Hackathon, the teams work for 5 consecutive days and build their hardware solutions for the proposed problem statements. The Grand Finale of Software Edition SIH 2018 was held on 30th & 31st March, 2018.

RESEARCH &QUALITY HIGHER EDUCATION:

Research and Quality Higher Education: AICTE has released a sum of Rs. 11.77 Crore under Research Promotional Scheme in the current Financial Year. The scheme aims at promoting research in engineering sciences and innovations in established and newer technologies; and to generate Master's and Doctoral degree candidates to augment the quality of faculty and research.

Under Modernisation and Removal of Obsolescence (MODROBS), AICTE has granted a sum of Rs. 16 Crore in the present financial year to the institutes for removing obsolescence in laboratories, workshops, etc. Rs.75 Crore approved for five New Research Parks at IIT Delhi, IIT Guwahati, IIT Kanpur, IIT Hyderabad and IISc Bangalore.

IMPRINT: IMPRINT was launched in 2015 to channelize the research in premier institutions into areas that can have largest social and economic good for the country. Under this initiative, research projects under 10 selected domains are jointly funded by MHRD and other participating Ministries/Departments. These domains are: health care, energy, sustainable habitat, nano technology hardware, water resources and river systems, advanced materials, information and communication technology, manufacturing, security and defence, and environmental science and climate change.

About 142 research projects with an outlay of Rs. 323.16 crore for 3 years with joint funding from MHRD and participating Ministries in the ratio of 50:50 have been approved and currently under execution.

Uchhatar Avishkar Yojana (UAY): The scheme was launched in 2015 with a view to promote innovation of a higher order that directly impacts the needs of the Industry and thereby improves the competitive edge of Indian manufacturing. The projects envisages collaboration between the academia and industry - within or outside India. The overall annual investment would be limited to Rs. 250.00 crore each year. The funding pattern of the projects selected would be 25% by Industry; 25 per cent by participating Department/Ministry; and 50% by MHRD. 87 projects at a cost of Rs.265.59 crore with joint funding from MHRD, participating Ministries and Industry in the ratio of 50:25:25 have been approved and currently under execution. Under UAY Phase-II, 65 projects with a total cost of Rs.139.48 Crore for a period of 3 years have been approved by the Apex Committee.

Other new Initiatives by HRD Ministry:

1. National Testing Agency: In pursuance of the Budget Announcement 2017-18, the Union Cabinet in its meeting held on 10.11.2017 approved creation of the National Testing Agency (NTA) as an autonomous and self-sustained premier testing organization to conduct all entrance examinations for higher education institutions in the country.

2. Improving Gender Balance: With a view to improving female enrolment in the B.TechProgrammes in IITs, a Committee under the chairmanship of Director, IIT-Mandi was constituted by the Joint Admission Board (JAB) to suggest suitable measures. The recommendations of the Committee were considered by the IIT Council in its 51st meeting held on 28.04.2017 and decided to increase female enrolment from the current 8% to 14% in 2018-19, 17% in 2019-20 and 20% in 2020-21 by creating supernumerary seats.

3. Project Monitoring Unit (PMU): In order to effectively monitor construction of campuses of all higher educational institutions under MHRD, a Project Monitoring Unit comprising experts in the field of construction has been set up. This will monitor the quality of the construction at the one hand and ensure that there is no time and cost overruns in these high value projects.