AICTE colleges need IITs' multidisciplinarity to produce Shubhanshu Shuklas: Member secretary

After nine years at All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), member secretary Rajive Kumar is set to retire on June 30. He has been with the top regulator for technical education through some of its most crucial reforms and decisions – the moratorium on new engineering colleges, introduction of minor degrees in BTech, curriculum change and the expansion of its regulatory ambit to polytechnics and programmes such as BCA and BBA.

Talking about the body’s challenges and achievements with Careers360, Kumar wished that in the future, engineering colleges are allowed more flexibility to become truly multidisciplinary. He also advocated for removing mathematics as a compulsory subject to pursue engineering, something AICTE tried for a brief period. While he is on his way out of the regulatory body, he is already part of the two committees formed by the ministry of education on the formation of Higher Education Commission Of India (HECI).

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Over your nine years at AICTE, what is that one reform you think you could not bring about?

I was going to speak about this in my farewell address. I want there to be no bar/restrictions on our colleges. We talk about interdisciplinarity in the NEP [National Education Policy 2020], but if we need a professor of mechanical engineering, we define the qualification and say he/she has to be from that engineering background. This kills innovation and multidisciplinarity in the department. I tried my best but I could not succeed. This type of freedom is there in IITs and IISc [Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institute of Science]. I come from the IIT system and I have studied there. One of the professors in my mathematics department had a PhD from civil engineering. IIT’s had this long back in the 70s.

Do you know the qualification of Subhanshu Shukla, the second person from the country to go to outer space? He has done his NDA [National Defence Academy] and got a BSc degree in computer science. After doing this, he did MTech from IISc. He did MTech in aerospace engineering. Our AICTE system doesn’t allow that. If we do not bring the change we will miss such Shuklas in the future.

There is one more thing. We tried to bring this change during [former chairman] Prof Anil Sahasrabudhe’s tenure. There are schools in remote areas where mathematics and science are not taught but the student has passion [for the subjects]. He is very good in mathematics but did not get the opportunity – we should not miss that student. It could be one or two in a million but we should look out for them. Engineering admissions are done on the basis of Joint Entrance Exams, where students are tested in physics, chemistry and mathematics. We removed mathematics from the list of compulsory subjects for BTech. There was a large hue and cry and we were fired from every quarter. They could not understand our motive. We had to take it back, but nowhere in the world such restrictions exist.

How do you view the future of AICTE with the Higher Education Commission of India (HECI) coming in?

The first question is, why are we doing it? There are multiple regulators regulating the same institution. We are not saying that the Pharmacy Council or Architecture Council or others will not be there. They will be there. They will set the standards and decide on the enrollment, intake. The only thing the government wants to ensure is that there’s a single agency for approval. The administration bit will be taken care of by HECI. Certifications will be done by the respective councils. It will only help the stakeholders.

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What now after AICTE for you?

I have been entrusted with some responsibility for the formation of HECI. I have been made part of the committee. There are three committees. One committee is headed by Radhakrishnan. The other committee is for regulation – how to synchronise the data of all three bodies, University Grants Commission, AICTE and National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE). The third committee is on integrating the professional bodies.

What do you think was the biggest change you could bring here? You’ve had a long tenure.

I joined the organisation in 2016. When I joined the organisation, there was a feeling in my circles that I should not be joining AICTE, as it did not have a good reputation among the masses. I am fortunate that, with my mentors and former chairpersons, Anil Sahasrabudhe and MP Punia, we worked as a team to try to change the perception of the council among the masses. I am now proud to say that we succeeded in that endeavour.

The first thing we started was the dialogue with colleges and faculty and we tried to understand their issues. The next thing was addressing these issues. We then formed committees, implementing changes, and defining policies. This is how the journey started. From 2016 to 2017, almost a year, we tried to understand the problems of our stakeholders. In 2017 we started working on it. It was very long work hours then.

In 2014, the Government of India had constituted a committee to review the functioning of AICTE. They had submitted their report – a big report – but no one had gone through it. As an advisor I feel my biggest achievement was that I took the report, studied it and came out with an agenda in March, 2017.

It was the starting point. It was a 10 point quality agenda, including revision of curriculum, teachers training, mandatory induction programme, accreditation, innovation, startup and internationalisation. One of the points was the exit test. Exit test in engineering programmes was proposed by the committee. We executed each and every initiative. I am happy to share that the 10 point quality agenda has been incorporated into the NEP 2020 but we had implemented it well before NEP came in.

With all this being implemented the perception among the masses started to change. To execute the changes we brought in faculty from IITs, National Institutes of Technology (NIT), central universities and even reputed private institutions.

It was not just about bringing and implementing the policies, but we also identified the bottlenecks in the implementation. After identifying the bottlenecks we took corrective measures. We have changed some points in the policy also.

Earlier AICTE’s function was seen as regulatory since we used to give approvals. Now the role of AICTE is that of facilitation. We also worked on the approval process and made it completely transparent and paperless. There is zero human intervention. Another point where we used to get a large number of complaints was during expert visits. We totally removed physical visits and developed a mechanism where visits are also held online.

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What was one of the most challenging tasks for you at AICTE?

In 2018 a judgement of the Supreme Court came in the matter of four deemed-to-be universities. The Supreme Court cancelled the BTech degrees awarded in distance mode for those who were registered in these universities before 2005. Then, AICTE was instructed to conduct a test to validate their degrees.

Tests had to be conducted in all BTech subjects. It is a four-year programme with a large number of disciplines, so you can imagine the number of subjects. We had to come up with the curriculum first. We framed the curriculum for 200 subjects and the time limit was three months. We were also asked to conduct practicals. We framed a list of practicals – I think there were around 3,000 across in all domains. We published the list and conducted the exams. It was a huge one.

The people appearing in these examinations were in senior levels. Some were chief engineers, some were superintending engineers and some had even retired. But it was important for them to attend the exam, else their degrees would be invalid. That was the biggest challenge in the nine years, but we successfully completed it. There was not a single complaint from anywhere. It was the biggest achievement of my team; I was supervising it.

After that I was given the opportunity to be member secretary in 2019.

How did your role change after becoming member secretary?

Along with being an advisor to the Chief Vigilance Officer, I was also in-charge of AICTE’s internal audit and so, was aware of the problems in other bureaux as well. Being a member secretary I got an opportunity to take corrective measures.

I revised every funding scheme of AICTE, and made it transparent. The distribution of money is equal all through the country. That gave different types of energy to the institutions, especially those in the remote areas. Some of the schemes were kept only for rural areas. Institutions in rural areas felt that they were being hand-held and this is how we could bring in change.

Another thing I would be proud about is the PRAGATI scholarship scheme. The girls scholarship was revised completely and the number of beneficiaries was doubled. Earlier we used to give 5,000 scholarships, it was made 10,000. We ensure that each and every girl who is eligible on merit gets the scholarship. Not all state governments were supporting it. They were lethargic. So I personally spoke to secretaries and asked them to encourage girls of their state to fill the forms. Now, it has become a movement.

As a teacher, what is one thing in the education system you would like to see change?

The education system will remain the same, only the thinking and perspective of the faculty have to change. They have to adapt to the fast-changing technology. I have been telling the faculties everywhere, if you do not change you will become redundant. If we have to remain in the system, we have to upskill, reskill.

At the senior level it is difficult but there is no alternative now but to remain relevant and learn the technology.