India signs credit pact with W-B for tech education

Wednesday, 05 February 2003, 20:30 IST
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NEW DELHI: The Indian government Tuesday signed a credit agreement with the World Bank to improve the quality of technical and engineering education in the country. As part of the agreement, the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank's concessionary lending arm, will give $250 million credit to the government, said a World bank statement issued here. Adarsh Kishore, additional secretary (department of economic affairs) in the ministry of finance and Michael Carter, country director (India) of World Bank signed the agreement. The credit is expected to help India boost the quality of its emerging young technicians and engineers and supply its economy with the level of professional excellence needed to foster greater competitiveness and productivity. The project will be implemented in the states of Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Uttar Pradesh. "I am happy that the World Bank is in partnership with the Government of India in accelerating the implementation of education reforms in the areas of school and professional education," said Carter. The project is designed to support engineering colleges, technical universities and polytechnics in achieving their own visions of academic excellence, said the World Bank statement. Institutions will be selected to participate in the project on a competitive basis depending on their capabilities and long-term planning for quality improvement. All selected institutions will be required to network with others and to provide services to the local community. It will also encourage granting of greater freedom to the institutions for their own governance and management of finances. "There is an urgent need to upgrade the quality of technical and engineering education in India to provide students with a virtuous cycle of opportunities," said Shashi Shrivastava, senior education specialist with the World Bank. "In this cycle, good training leads to better jobs, better jobs lead to increased productivity and increased productivity leads to accelerated growth of the Indian economy which, in turn, impacts poverty reduction," he added. In the initial phase, about 20 well-performing engineering education institutions will be selected as lead institutions, and a further 60 to 80 institutions will be networked with them. "This will impact over 100,000 students, approximately 10 percent of the total number of students enrolled for engineering degrees in India," said the World Bank. "A major share of the funding will be utilised for quality-enhancing activities, such as the introduction of teaching and research programmes in cutting edge technologies, and modernisation of existing programmes and facilities. "Some of the funding will be utilised for faculty training, extension services and development of new facilities, depending on the long-term plan presented by each of the selected institutions."
Source: IANS
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