Higher Education Commission: A great idea if executed carefully.

Higher Education Commission (HEC) of India repeal of University Grants Commission (UGC) Act. This is a great move towards enhancing excellence in higher education in the nation. The main challenge is how to enhance the functional excellence of the HEC.
The following provisions may be ensured: • For the effective integration of HEC, NAAC may be merged with HEC. • There should be a provision to create Indian Education Service (IES) under this Act. • To enhance the functional capability, HEC may be treated as an apex body integrated with a series of sub-commissions fixing specific responsibilities like educational excellence, research excellence, community services, quality assurance/ accreditation, recruitment and training of VCs and professors, international education, equivalencies, national data bank etc. • State HEC should form an integral part of Central HEC and should function with uniform regulations. • MHRD may release funds for higher education institutions at the advice of HEC. • There should be provision for compulsory adoption of a Model Act by all universities including private universities in the nation.

Selection of Commission Chairman, Members, and VCs for all Universities: • Selection may be made entirely apolitical. • A multi-tier screening exercise may be adopted by several independent bodies with the sole intention of filtering out capable and qualified individuals only. • HEC should be made responsible for the meritorious selection of high-quality VCs for all the Indian universities including private universities. • Yearly Performance Assessment should be made compulsory for Chairman, members of HEC and VCs on an annual basis for extension of annual terms. • Performance evaluation shall be done by independent committees yearly. • Independent performance scoring by at least 100 senior VCs of the nation based on a confidential digital scoring technique. • Duration of office of Chairman, members, and VCs may be fixed initially for 2 or 3 years with the opportunity for annual term extension based on yearly performance.
Retirement/ Appointment age for Chairman and members of HEC and VCs: • Retirement/appointment age should be linked not to the chronological age but only to the performance efficiency in order to avail quality service of passionate and experienced educationists.
Filling up of Vacancies: • Action for filling up of vacancies (Chairman, Members, and VCs) should be initiated at least 6 months ahead of the date of arising the vacancy to ensure continuity of office. • There should be provision for creating a division similar to UPSC under HEC for recruitment of Vice-chancellors and Professors to ensure quality.
There should be a mini committee at MHRD level to assess the performance of the HEC for submitting performance reports on a half-yearly basis.

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