IITs, IIMs in bad position: Joshi

New Delhi: Premier institutes IITs and IIMs are in "bad position" as they only contribute to transfer of capital to developed nations, senior BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi said, claiming that the country's youth is being reduced to "tailors" rather than "textile makers". The former Union HRD minister also suggested that the government should assess the country's technological power before introducing development schemes.

"The IITs and IIMs are in a bad position... they are only contributing to transfer of capital to developed countries. We are not creating opportunities here and the students who pass out from these institutes are only contributing to management of multinational companies of other countries," he said. The former Union Human Resource minister was addressing the 5th National Summit on Institutionalising Academia-Industry interface organised by PHD chamber.

Joshi, Member of Parliament from Kanpur, said that the country is focusing more on borrowing technology rather than creating technology which is reducing educated youth into "tailors" rather than "textile makers". "Vajpayeeji had mooted a wonderful idea of quadrangle roads. But even before the concept plan for how the roads will be constructed was worked out, Volvo came up with buses that can be run on those roads.

It is good to borrow technology but ultimately our projects don't generate employment and revenue for our youth but become a profit making ground for others. "Governments need to realise that they need to assess technological power of the country before progressing on such schemes so they do not cause long term loss to the country," he said.

"We were exploring how research can be encouraged in institutions. Then the government changed and they converted CSIR into a university thereby destroying a perfect platform for research. Labs and universities have different mandates and two cannot serve the same purpose," he said.

Commenting on the industry-academia linkage in the country, Joshi said the industry's focus has always been on the higher education institutions while secondary as well as primary sectors have been ignored at large. "One there are no fixed terms of reference about the association that industry and academic institutions should share.

Secondly, whatever interaction between the two exists involves only higher educational institutions. Industry considers secondary education area to be a bad investment as the returns are delayed," he said "I observed as a minister that the suggestions that officers used to send to me had grammatical mistakes.

Imagine, IAS officers! This happens because the country does not focus on primary and secondary education which in a way is the highest dividend paying investment," he added.