By Ramesh Jain A big chunk of the funding of public and private universities in India has been taken by the rich and the poor, according to a new report.
The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) found that out of the total $2.8 billion that was spent on the education of the country’s 1.2 billion people in 2014-15, only about two-third of it was spent by the top 5% of earners.
The top 1% spent $3.3 billion on education, which amounted to just 3% of the $2 billion in total education spending, according the report.
Its findings come as the government prepares to introduce a new formula for the funding formula for state universities.
The report says that a small percentage of the money raised by state universities can be used to support the students of the bottom 99% of society, and that the rest of the revenue generated by the institutions can be spent on education for all.
“The bottom 99.9% have been disproportionately affected by the high costs of education,” said Dr Arundhati Roy, co-author of the report and a senior professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
“We find that over 60% of students are not able to pay for education even when they are qualified.
They cannot afford the tuition fees that universities charge, which are much higher than those of other public institutions.”
Roy, who has been working on education reform for over a decade, said the problem was that the top 1%, who had the most to gain from the reforms, were not paying enough.
“When they were making their money, they were able to afford higher education.
They are the ones who have the most opportunity to benefit from the reform,” Roy said.
But the report also pointed out that some of the richest students in India do not receive financial support from the state, even though they are often the richest among them.
“For instance, the top 500 wealthiest students in the country, who earn over $1 billion, are not entitled to a government grant or loan,” Roy explained.
As the world’s biggest economy, India is ranked first among OECD countries by gross domestic product (GDP) per capita.
According to the World Bank, it ranks in the bottom two of the five most unequal countries in the world.
The average salary for a PhD in India is $1,000, while the average salary in India for a professional is $2,500.
In a recent report, the UN Foundation for Education said that the cost of tuition fees at India’s top-ranked universities is nearly 10 times higher than that of the lowest-ranked public universities.
The report found that the average student debt at public universities is around $1.2 million, while that of private universities is about $500 million.
More to come
