More is not better

Rather than building more universities, the goal should be to ensure they offer what today’s students need.

A job well started is a job half done. This is particularly true in the case of research. Good research should be the starting point of any long-term project. Yet ours is not a society that puts much value on research, and so we routinely start big schemes on an ad hoc basis, only to later regret the lamentable outcome. To take just one example, federal and provincial governments seem to be competing to set up new universities. Yes, the country desperately needs more centres of higher education, but only of the right kind. This is why a task force led by National Planning Commission member Pushpa Raman Wagle has recommended that the government first pass a law to set up a mechanism that would offer suggestions on higher education.