Centre planning steps to launch virtual universities: Pokhriyal

NEW DELHI: The Union Government has planned to take steps to establish virtual universities to achieve the desired gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher education as envisaged in New Education Policy (NEP) 2020.

The decision was taken during a meeting of education minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ with the senior officials of the ministry to review the implementation of NEP 2020. The NEP envisions increasing the GER in higher education to 50 percent by 2035.

Recently Prime Minister Narendra Modi also speaking at the convocation of Tezpur University also talked about virtual universities where everyone from any part of the world could come and teach and learn.

The education minister said that the virtual universities will be different from the open universities.

NEP 2020: Higher education

As per a statement issued by the ministry, Pokhriyal directed appointment of nodal persons in all the concerned ministries to coordinate the implementation of NEP 2020. “For all the 181 tasks identified for implementation in Higher Education, every task must be led by its own team leader,” he added.

Pokhriyal said that the National Education Technology forum (NETF) should be seeded in the University Grants Commission (UGC) or the technical education regulatory body, the AICTE (All India Council for Technical Education) and should start the work immediately.

“The minister called for using artificial intelligence and machine learning technology for imparting studies in mother languages in higher education,” reads the release.

Pokhriyal asked the committee constituted for the ‘Stay in India’ programme to work in a mission mode and submit the report within 15 days. The statement reads: “He said the committee should analyse the reasons behind students going abroad for pursuing studies.”

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