Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill
Biju Dharmapalan
bijudharmapalan@gmail.com
India’s higher education system is at a crossroads. In spite of years of regulatory control by agencies like the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), issues regarding quality, regulatory redundancy, procedural inflexibility, and a predominantly superficial accreditation culture have persisted all along. These institutions were established by the political elite to satisfy the whims and fancies of a few people, mainly aspiring for positions. Moreover, the concept of discipline-specific agencies is a compartmentalised academic paradigm that is now obsolete. The Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025 aims to rectify these structural deficiencies not via incremental change, but via a comprehensive reconfiguration of the governance, accreditation, and direction of higher education towards quality, relevance, and equity.
.The Bill proposes a major architectural change, replacing various overlapping regulatory bodies with a single, overarching organisation, the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan. It is supported by three clearly defined, operationally independent sectors- Standards, Accreditation, and Regulation. The continued existence of several discipline-specific councils has become more arduous and ineffectual in the age of transdisciplinary learning, when science , technology and the humanities converge, with societal concerns. While conventional regulatory frameworks were created to govern discrete domains, modern knowledge advances at intersections. The Bill maintains functional specialisation while eliminating jurisdictional ambiguity, authority duplication, and institutional uncertainty to remedy this historical disparity.
The quality enhancement under the new framework is distinctly focused on outcomes. The proposed Accreditation Council is tasked with creating an outcome-oriented Institutional Accreditation Framework that emphasises educational outcomes, governance quality, financial integrity, and transparent public disclosure, rather than simply enumerating classrooms, laboratories, and faculty numbers. This signifies a distinct shift from the input-centric accreditation mentality that has historically afflicted Indian higher education. Under the new regime, accreditation has transitioned from an episodic exercise to a continuous, technology-driven, publicly transparent process aimed at fostering confidence and credibility.
The Bill mandates public self-of academic, financial, administrative, and accreditation-related information. This directly confronts the policies of the UGC-AICTE-NCTE, where an information asymmetry was evident. The Bill empowers the Regulatory Council to act promptly and within specified timescales against misrepresentation or misconduct carried out by the institutions. It also safeguards student interests, replacing ambiguous oversight with straightforward accountability.
Another long-standing tension between autonomy and regulation is addressed by the Act. Autonomy was a privilege rather than a merit-based outcome under previous systems; it was also uneven and discretionary. Institutions can move towards academic, administrative, and financial autonomy in a graded, time-bound manner under the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Bill, which directly links autonomy to accrediting performance.
The establishment of a specialised Standards Council enhances the system by transitioning from prescription to guidance. The Council will establish graduate qualities, learning outcomes, certification systems, and credit transfer mechanisms rather than prescribing a curriculum. This addresses a significant critique of AICTE and NCTE, whose stringent curriculum oversight frequently hinders multidisciplinary innovation. The innovative methodology enables institutions and faculty to develop contextually relevant, future-oriented programs while adhering to national academic standards.
The Bill’s impact extends beyond elite or urban institutions. Its most transformational potential is in the reconfiguration of rural and semi-urban higher education. For decades, rural institutions have faced excessive regulation, insufficient funding, and inequitable assessment based on standardised metrics disconnected from local contexts. By emphasising outcomes over inputs, the Bill establishes a more fair framework that enables rural colleges to showcase their strengths in community participation, vocational integration, local innovation, and the preservation of indigenous and Bharatiya knowledge systems.
Graded autonomy enables competent rural colleges to attain autonomy or confer degrees, diminishing reliance on remote metropolitan universities and mitigating educational inequity generated by migration. The Bill prioritises open, distance, online, and digital education-limited to accredited institutions-thereby enhancing accessibility for first-generation students, women, and working youth. Effective credit transfer systems provide adaptable learning trajectories that correspond with rural livelihoods, preventing students from having to choose between education and survival.
The Bill promotes transdisciplinary institutions and integrates vocational education into higher education, aligning learning with local economies such as agriculture, crafts, healthcare, rural entrepreneurship, and the development of green skills. Rural institutions are now viewed not just as passive beneficiaries but as active participants in national development.
The Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill is a legislative effort that understands the future at a time when higher education institutions need to prepare pupils for complexity, unpredictability, and convergence. It changes Indian higher education from being run by rules to being run by trust, from separate disciplines to integrated ecosystems, and from following the rules to being credible. If the Bill is passed honestly and with an understanding of diversity, it might mark a turning point in Bharat’s education system. It could be a true reflection of a Viksit Bharat, where excellence is open to everyone, autonomy is earned, and learning knows no limits.
(The author is the Dean -Academic Affairs, Garden City University, Bangalore and an adjunct faculty at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore)
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