The festive Navaratri season fasting is for the resting body, mind and soul to search elevated ideals. Once the fasting season ends, comes the feasting festival of sorts, Deepavali that elevates peoples’ moods to fun and food. This transition from fasting to feasting is an annual ritual in our Indic tradition practiced in an unparalleled way with unbroken continuum. Just as this celebration feasting from regimental fasting signals human anatomy’s lifestyle transition, there needs to a cerebral feasting from regimental fasting in higher education institution (HEI) to signal academic autonomy transition. Here is more.
Let me begin with the Trumpian volte-face as an ex-Presidential candidate to his current Presidential stance that is tellingly visible. Trump’s sudden H1B policy reversal salvo is a red card jerk to his election campaign assurance of a diploma on graduation with a green card perk. Be that as it may, the repercussions of the same has different effects for different nations. For Indian techies, it’s an opportunity to step into a new future with the past providing certain guidance vectors. The latest dispatch of The Economist states that seven of the top 10 tech companies that benefitted from the H1B visa are American including the Big 5: Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft and Meta, and three Indian firms—TCS, Infosys and Cognizant. The majority beneficiary of H1B visa is the Indians who have garnered over 60 per cent of the H1B visas issued between October 2020 to June 2025 with China a distant 12 per cent (pause to ponder the benefits that China has accrued domestically) and no other country greater than two per cent. Another National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) study by Wharton provides an interesting perspective on how globalised American MNCs internationalise workforce by circumventing local restrictive policies. For every visa rejection, such firms employ 0.9 people abroad at their own facilities (read GCCs) with India, China and Canada their preferred off-shore destinations, an emerging opportunity for India to capitalise. There is a strong case for greater autonomy to Indian HEIs in the spirit of being ‘Atmanirbhar’ as much as its given to foreign university campuses in India. Here is why.
As per the latest Open Doors data of the Institute of International Education, Indian students constitute 30 per cent of the international student community with STEM and Management education (60 per cent) being the most sought after in the top 5 destinations—US, UK, Canada, Australia and Germany. The main reasons for students flocking to international destinations are: charm of a foreign land, flexibility and institutional autonomy that foreign universities enjoy and promise of a foreign job, and lifestyle. At a domestic level for India, we definitely can boast of a rich culture but still grappling with infrastructure issues despite improving trajectory. The second is related to academic policy making which has begun well but still restricted to the ‘elitist’ few and needs to extend to deserving plenty. The third is linked to policy reforms that are bilateral with each sovereign nation’s interest being of paramount importance. In the middle of this three-dimensional confluence, lies the hope for Indian higher education. If hope is not delayed disappointment, then the action has to begin now in Deepavali Dhamaka fashion.
The NEP 2020 is a charter for reforms in which institutional autonomy forms the centrepiece for higher education transformation through skilling, training, education, research, innovation and entrepreneurship. The first five years have been a mixed bag of sensitisation and action with the former gaining majority space and energy. The next decade belongs to NEP 2020 actions that shall propel Viksit Bharat @ 2047 to matured work in process by 2035. One actionable agenda is the need to provide complete autonomy— financial, administrative, and academic to all deserving HEIs. Unless this is given, there is very little scope and incentive for institutional reforms which is a key trigger to retain domestic talent. The current mode of full autonomy to select-few HEIs has demonstrated a welcome reversal in student traffic and a case in point for sweeping reforms in HEI autonomy, a much-needed main course.
NEP 2020 is the anatomy of India’s higher education transformation and its appetiser reforms have shown promise. It is now the time to serve the main course with multiple options for HEIs to choose from. The status-quo restrictive fasting menu has to expand to a full-autonomy driven feasting menu to retain Indian talent in India making India the preferred off-shore destination for global technology companies. In short: Fasting Anatomy Requires Feasting Autonomy. Is anybody listening?
