Amend TANSCHE Act to make council consortium of State Universities: Expert panel

CHENNAI: In an effort to give more teeth to the Tamil Nadu State Council for Higher Education (TANSCHE), an expert committee constituted by the State government has recommended conferring independent powers to the council. The committee has called for the TANSCHE Act’s amendment to make it possible.

The plan is to make TANSCHE a consortium of all Universities in the State, which would help the council to function with inputs from all the Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) across all the State and draw talents for any of its entities.

At present, functions of the council are restricted to co-ordination and determination of standards in institutions of higher education, research, scientific and technical institutions in accordance with the guidelines issued by the University Grants Commission (UGC), from time to time.

A senior official from the Higher Education Department told DT Next that such a move will also help it to include HEIs in the State in the NIRF ranking system. "The TANSCHE Act, 1992 requires necessary amendment by conferring independent powers to strengthen the council to do so. The amendment will help set standards in higher education on par with the best of the institutions in the country and incentivise the State universities to improve themselves on educational services," he added.

Stating that the TANSCHE Act should be amended to make it a consortium of all Universities in the State, he said the universities could also nominate ex-officio members in the council so that it is always fully functional in terms of membership and active participation of all HEIs.

"The scope of the TANSCHE could also be expanded in collaboration with other State universities to regulate private higher educational institutions, both colleges and universities, to proactively declare the quality standards, fees collected and teachers on roll," he said.

He added that in extreme cases the right to visit the private higher educational institutions for academic audit should be vested with the State government. “TANSCHE should be empowered to initiate and take the lead in a major quality upgradation move of higher education in the State."

Explaining the other amendments required, the official said the mandate of TANSCHE should be expanded by conducting research in all aspects of higher education. Some of them are policy, financing, thrust areas, publications and patents from HEIs in the State, apart from curriculum and pedagogy, with a regular series of publications on its own. "With time, an autonomous State institute of higher education can be set up and that would take over such functions," the official added.

In addition to the panel recommendations, the TANSCHE is also taking measures to ensure quality enhancement in the appointment of assistant and associate professors in self-financing colleges through qualification approval. "Measures for improving the efficacy of research programmes through structured duration for full-time and part-time courses will also be undertaken by the council", the official added.