Academics have termed the decision of Union HRD ministry not permitting the Indian Institute of Management-Bangalore (IIM-B) to set up its proposed centre in Singapore as irrational. | |
| "We don't know what made the government reject IIMB's request to expand beyond India. An institution can offer many products to students. It does not mean that merely by not going overseas more campuses will be opened in India and meet the increasing demand in the country for high quality management education," said Sunderarajan, chairperson, N S Raghavan Centre for Entrepreneurial Learning (NSRCEL) at IIMB. |
| |
| The ministry, in a meeting with IIM directors last month, had asked the institute to cater to the growing demand in India before going abroad. According to the existing memorandum of association of IIMs, overseas branches are not allowed. |
| |
| The ministry apparently had no problems with institutes offering short-term courses overseas, but was against IIMs offering long-term programmes by opening full fledged campuses abroad. |
| |
| IIMB had announced, it will open a research and management education centre as a campus in Singapore. IIMB planned to start a host of management programmes like part-time MBA programmes for middle-level executives, executive MBA programmes for senior-level executives, short-duration executive-education programmes for managers and customised executive-education programmes for companies. |
| |
| Sunderarajan said education is international in nature. IIMB, by opening a campus in Singapore, would have generated a lot of goodwill for Indian education and income for it. |
| |
| "It will be a great learning exercise to go international. In the globalised world, when we are allowed to export any commodity, why not education? Why should education be kept under the negative list," he asked. |
| |
| He said the ministry's decision will not come in the way of NSRCEL from conducting short-term programmes in Singapore. It plans to conduct short-term courses for family-run enterprises in Singapore this year. |
| |
| Union science and technology minister Kapil Sibal on Thursday criticised the human resource development ministry for turning down a request from IIMB to open a campus in Singapore. He said it went against the objective of "releasing the genius of the Indian people". |
| |
| Speaking at an event organised by Microsoft Research India here, he said, "I think the challenge ahead for our government and for any government of the future is to release (higher) educational institutions from the control of government." |
| |
| But that does not mean opening the educational sector for exploitation, he hastened to add. |
| |
|
| |
