In the recent past, economists have dramatically changed
their view about the role of population in economic development. As a result of
this shift in their view from that of pessimism to optimism, we often come
across political leaders gloating about India’s young and growing population
and its potential to add about 2 percentage points per annum to per capita GDP
growth over the next two decades. This glib talk that is further flavoured by
an argument that the share of the working-age population in the total
population of India is likely to continue to increase until about 2035 to 2040
creating a strong impulse for economic growth is sure to warm the cockles of
the poor voter’s heart on the street.
Before getting into the nitty-gritty of DD, let us first look
at what this DD is all about: According to 12 Five year Plan document, “One hundred
and eighty three million additional income-seekers are expected to join the
workforce over the next 15 years”, which means roughly 12 million people would
be joining the workforce every year. And
by 2030, our workforce would be larger than that of the China. The expectation
is that as our workforce thus swells up, they would find job and earn money and
spend it , our economy too would do well. And this is what the expected
demographic dividend that India is hoping on to achieve an annual growth rate
of 10 per cent in GDP
But all this talk about our demographic dividend and its
supposed benefits is put forward from the point of supply of labour alone. No
one is talking about it from the perspective of demand for labour. And therein
lies the catch, for in a well-functioning economy with competitive product and
factor markets, there is no guaranty that demand for labour would match supply.
Secondly, today’s technological improvements have substantially reduced the
demand for human labour in almost every sector of the industry and even if any
demand arises it is only for highly-skilled labour.
In this context, it is worth recalling what Prof. Avinash
Kamalakar Dixit, from Princeton University—whose current research
interests centred on ’institutional economics’—said: “there is a great danger
of India wasting the demographic dividend for two reasons: “The poor quality of
education, and the low rate of female participation in the labour force.”
This straightaway takes us to the not-so-impressive scenario
prevailing among Indian universities. Right from the way the vice chancellors
are selected for our public universities to recruiting faculty and the
commitment of faculty to the cause of education, to the appalling
faculty-student ratio speaks volumes about “the credibility of universities in
advancing the spirit of inquiry, the spirit of curiosity and the spirit of excellence
among the young students and scholars.”
It’s an irony that Universities that are supposed to widen
the canvas of knowledge by maintaining high standards are instead granting
‘grace marks’ to let out its students with a pass certificate. The result is:
you have graduates all around but no eligible candidates for hiring by the
industry.
Interestingly, Prof. Devesh Kapur from University of
Pennsylvania in a recent interview to The Hindu made some candid
observations that merit the attention of every well-meaning citizen of this
country. Wondering about the role of scholars and faculty in the universities funded
by the public money, he has thrown an innocuous question at the Universities to
ponder: “Should it be activism or research?” He then asserts that “research is
not a part-time activity.” He goes on to say, “Din bhar morcha kiya, raat ko do ghanta kaam kiya—engage in
protests through the day, do precious little at night”, which he asserts that
leads us to nowhere for, “good research requires tremendous commitment over a
sustained period.”
Lamenting at the evil that started with JP’s Movement in the
1970s, which was considered nice then, that spoiled universities in north India
—as though universities in south are any better—he said that our universities,
instead of becoming broad-based elite institutions solely engaged in
“introducing students to a world of intellectual responsibility and
intellectual discovery”, have today become highly political and parochial.
Perhaps to highlight the widespread parochialism in our
Universities, Prof Devesh Kumar, drawing our attention to Calcutta University,
states that as against Ramans and Krishnans of yester era, today there are only
Bengalis in every department. Perhaps, same would be the case with all state
universities. For that matter, with the growing regionalism, the position has
only further deteriorated: for instance, in Andhra University, as against
Dutts, Sundarams, Hussains of early independent India, its departments are today
chaired mostly by people hailing from the districts around it. And the net result of all this narrowness is:
instead of fanning the open-mindedness among the students when their minds are
in a formative phase, we are paving the way for ghettoised living, said Dr
Kapur. And this growing parochialism and
the resulting ‘Us versus Them’ syndrome had simply made universities as platforms
for nurturing political ambitions.
Except for the few elitist institutions
like IITs, and islands of excellence here and there, our university system as a
whole is plagued by this malady, malady of mediocrity, and yet no political
party in the country is ready to question this growing malaise, though a
dysfunctional public institution is known to cause social injustice.
And if this grows unchecked, the
demographic dividend that is supposed to cause economic growth may instead lead
to disaster, for without good public institutions even great wealth can become
fragile.
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