What next?

The theory of unintended consequences has been proven once again; Murli Manohar Joshi's ill-advised move to bring the Indian Institutes of Management under the active thumb of an ill-intentioned Ministry of Human Resource Development has done no lasting damage.

Instead, the new government has given the IIMs the freedom to run their own affairs, including decide on fees; and the directors, newly alive to the problem of indigent students, have decided to offer need-based scholarships.

Since the institutes are not short of resources, this is a welcome development. One hopes there will now be other unintended benefits flowing from this denouement, since the institutes have often been subjected to non-financial controls by the government that serve no particular purpose "" like determining when, how and for what purposes professors can travel.

Also, since government money is better spent on primary education, the institutes should strive to become financially self-supporting through fees, more advanced management programmes and consultancy contracts, not to speak of greater student throughput so that their facilities get used more fully.

That should be just the beginning. The HRD ministry, having done the right thing by the IIMs, should now devote attention to the state of affairs at the All-India Council of Technical Education, which is in the business of prescribing standards for business schools (as also architectural training establishments) and according them recognition. As has been noted frequently during the controversy over the IIMs, the AICTE has been remiss in granting recognition to all manner of hole-in-the-wall institutes that can barely claim a postal address "" as Prof U R Rao has pointed out.

Indeed, the Rao report should be released and not kept confidential, so that the issues it focused on get publicly discussed and addressed.

There is the question of upgrading the business schools as a whole, of which there are now more than 900. This is an extraordinary number, until it is realised that the average B-school has only four full-time faculty members.

Since that is the average, many have even less. By one assessment, only 250 of the 900 and more can qualify as places where serious education is imparted. This is a pointer to the way in which professional education in the country (not just B-schools but also private medical and engineering colleges) has become a hunting ground for quick and easy money.

Upgrading all 900 B-schools is an urgent task, and the biggest shortage is of qualified and experienced professors. The ministry as well as AICTE should focus on addressing this issue in a productive and cooperative manner.

If the upgradation proves impossible to achieve, then the AICTE should introduce more rigorous standards and cancel the recognition accorded to those institutes that don't make the grade. Potential students and parents should be able to recognise the difference between places that offer quality education and those that don't.

In many ways, this is more important than rescuing the IIMs from the clutches of a Murli Manohar Joshi.