New Delhi: In a big development from promotion education via ICT in university education, from July onwards, in total 38 universities across India would be Wi-Fi enabled. Mr Prakash Javadekar, Union Minister, Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), today (16 May 2017) informed this in a press conference. Academic and research audit of 11 Central Universities is in progress which will boost the academic and research quality.
The Wi-Fi enabled environment will promote ICT in teaching and learning process. Further, the Wi-Fi enabled campus will help in providing low cost and affordable high quality e-content to all the students across the nation.
The minister also informed that National Testing Agency (NTA), an autonomous, self-sustaining premier testing organization to conduct all entrance examinations for higher institutions, is priority for the government. The will be operationalised in the near term. NTA will free up the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), etc. so that these bodies can focus more on academics.
Mr Javadekar also informed that national academic depository (NAD), a digital platform to store academic certificates, will be operationalised this year. The process of reforming the UGC and AICTE, the two higher education regulators, is in progress. The universities or higher learning institutes will be provided graded autonomy. Hence, quality institutes will be provided freedom for quality institutions and regulations will implemented for institutions with low quality. The open learning system will be expanded, said the minister.
The minister also briefed the media persons that currently there are 800 universities and 41,864 coleges in India. There are 23 Indian Institutes of technology (IITs), 20 Indian Institutes of Managements (IIMs), 31 National Institutes of Technology (NITs), 20 Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs) and 7 Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISER). There are more than 2.84 crore students in the higher education system and 14.3 lakh teachers.
