Having lost that pre-eminence, one would presume that India would endeavour to become a global centre of learning once again.  Instead, during the past five decades since Independence, India has been destroying one centre of learning after another, often at the altar of populism.  Phrases like ‘affordable higher education for all’, ‘teaching is a noble profession’, and ‘people should not profit from education’ have together, in their various transmutations and incarnations, succeeded in destroying education in India. 

W<>atch some figures.  Last year, at least 120,000 Indian students enrolled for higher studies in just four countries, states the discussion paper, of the Government of India’s Ministry of Commerce, on “Trade in Education services: Higher Education in India and GATS: an opportunity”  (see table).  If one includes countries like Canada, France, China, Russia and Singapore among scores of others (like those in the Middle East), the number could be at least 50% higher. <> 

Consider the implications.  Each student ends up paying anywhere between US$15,000 to US$30,000 annually for tuition fees.  Add another US$15,000  towards living expenses.  That is why, education counselors advise parents to set aside around Rs.20 lakh per student per year for higher studies abroad.  This means that  the total annual outgo from India to just these four countries is as high as Rs.24,000 crore!  This is the subsidy India provides, year after year, for teachers teaching in those countries; because foreign students generally pay two to three times the fees paid by local students.

Table

Who pays for the teachers?
Indian Students Abroad
Name of Country	2003-04	2004-05
USA	79,736	80,466
UK	11,000	15,000
Australia	17,853	22,279
New Zealand	2,405	2,567
Total	110,994	120,312
Source: WENR (World Education News and Reviews), IDP Australia, IIE ; Ministry of Commerce, Govt. of India

By subsidizing teachers’ salaries overseas, India encourages the drift of teaching talent. Without good teachers, eager students, who can pay the costs, will travel abroad to improve their lot.  Since teaching as a profession in India does not offer good salaries, most of these students -- when they return  -- will seek jobs in other professions. Consider, for instance, how today even the IITs cannot get good teachers. 

<>India’s teaching capabilities are therefore getting crippled. But numbers conceal this malaise. Total enrolment for higher studies in India went up from 0.2 million in 1947-48 to well over 10.5 million in 2005-06.  Yet, consider the quality!  Advertise for the post of an office assistant, and you will get more than a thousand applications.  Start interviewing them, and you will find that barely 10% of them can read and write a sentence properly.  Give them an elementary mathematical quiz, and just around 20% will get the scores a graduate ought to have. <> 

Without good teachers, even the best of talent withers away.  The masses remain uneducated, though literate.  Eventually, this destroys the entire nation.  If India cannot retain its best teaching talent, and attract better teachers, it could suffer from intellectual colonization, with far-reaching adverse consequences. <> 

So is there a solution?

<>Yes, India needs to re-focus on bringing back the best talent into teaching, so that the next generation of students could be trained at home.  That is what China has been doing diligently.  <> 

To bring back this talent, it is essential to pay teachers the salaries they would have earned in developed countries like the US or Singapore. Today, however, India refuses to pay its teachers more.  Not surprisingly, many Indian teachers have moved away from teaching to better jobs in India.  Some have even opted to teach overseas.  <> 

To revive good teaching, teachers must first regain the dignity and the pride of place in society that they once enjoyed.  That alone will augment the number of good teachers, strengthen existing educational institutions, restore quality education, and encourage the best of students to study at home.