Editorial 1: In India, education without employment

Context

The educational system has no clear understanding of the employability of India's graduates in the workforce.

Introduction

Supporters of the current government’s educational policies claim that education is now free from past government constraints. They highlight initiatives like Atal Tinkering Labs, coding in middle school, recruiting Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe teachers, and empowering Muslim girl students. The key claim is that the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 “will lead to an educational renaissance.”

Key Issue: Educational System and Graduate Employability

• The educational system is clueless about the employability of graduates in the ever-changing marketplace.
• Education has multiple roles: it enables, energizes, and elevates. As Vivekananda said, it empowers one to stand on their own feet.
• After 75 years, India has sacrificed both excellence and equity, leading to graduates unable to find meaningful employment. Degrees are often not worth the paper they are printed on.
• It doesn’t matter if these issues were created or ignored by Congress or BJP. The current government must take action and clean up the mess. The NEP 2000 is the fourth attempt at reforming education, after the Radhakrishnan Commission (1948), Kothari Commission (1966), and Officers’ Commission (1985).
• What Makes a Good Education?
  • Depth: Provides technical expertise for employability.
  • Breadth: Offers flexibility in an AI-driven ecosystem, requiring constant re-skilling to stay relevant.

Lack of Progress in NEP Implementation

• Four Years On: There is little to no evidence that any of the NEP recommendations have been effectively implemented.
• Graduate Employability: In 2025, India’s overall graduate employability rate stands at 42.6%, almost unchanged from 44.3% in 2023.
• Knowledge-Intensive Employment: In 2023, only 11.72% of jobs were in knowledge-intensive sectors.
• E-commerce Jobs: NEP's emphasis on multiple entries and exits has resulted in low-quality and poorly paid jobs in e-commerce.

The High Rate of Educated Unemployment

• The current high rate of educated unemployment indicates that education in India is actually disempoweringstudents.
• NEP's Approach: The NEP is a retreat to an outdated mid-20th century U.S. model, without the necessary financial support.
• Outdated and Unviable: The NEP is financially unviable in India in 2025, with superficial ideas like Indian Knowledge Systems (IKS), mother tongue learning, and flexible curricula, but no methodology to implement them.
• Implementation Issues: The NEP relies only on course choice to correct imbalances, without considering that the course content itself may be unworkable.
• Lack of Industry Representation: There was no industry or business representation in the committee that drafted the NEP.

University Rankings and Growth Claims

• QS World University Rankings (WUR): It is claimed that 11 Indian universities are ranked in the top 500 of the QS WUR.
• Growth in Rankings: 318% growth in the performance of Indian universities is highlighted, but this statistic ignores India’s low ranking (above 100) and poor publication quality.

• Press Releases: The Ministry has promoted these improvements in Press Information Bureau releases (Feb 13, 2025), claiming Indian universities showed the highest performance improvement among G-20 nations.
• Government’s Misunderstanding: In this digital age, the government fails to recognize the commercial implications of agencies like QS and THE, and the reasons behind their skewed and deceptive analyses.

Unrealized Outcomes of Mega Research Projects

• Past Projects: Several mega research projects were launched with great fanfare, such as:
  • New Millennium project (CSIR-NMITLI)
  • $10 Akash tablet project
  • IMPRINT (IMPacting Research INnovation and Technology)
• Despite being in the spotlight for years, the public remains unaware of the outcomes of these projects, despite hundreds of crores of taxpayer money being spent.
• Taxpayer Expectations: The focus should be on whether these projects provided value for money, regardless of whether they were initiated or shut down by Congress or BJP.

India’s Global Innovation Index (GII)

• Rankings: India’s ranks in the Global Innovation Index (GII):
  • 2014: 76
  • 2015: 81
  • 2024: 39
• Comparison with Other Nations: Malaysia and Türkiye rank higher than India in the GII, with ranks of 33 and 37, respectively.

• Innovation Clusters: India has four key innovation clusters:
  • Bengaluru (Rank: 56)
  • Delhi (Rank: 63)
  • Chennai (Rank: 82)
  • Mumbai (Rank: 84)

Bengaluru vs. Silicon Valley

• Bengaluru’s Comparison: The Bengaluru cluster is often compared to Silicon Valley, particularly regarding startups and Unicorns, but its 56th rank is far behind Silicon Valley’s 6th rank.
• Cluster Intensity: The intensity of the top 100 clusters reveals:
  • Bengaluru: Ranked 94
  • Chennai: Ranked 96
  • Delhi: Ranked 98
  • Mumbai: Ranked 99
  • Silicon Valley: Ranked 2
  • Cambridge: Ranked 1

Patent and Scientific Publications Comparison

• Silicon Valley Cluster:
  • Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) applications per capita: 7885
  • Scientific publications per capita: 9211
• Bengaluru Cluster:
  • PCT applications per capita: 313
  • Scientific publications per capita: 1077
• Leading Patentee in Bengaluru: Samsung Electronics (South Korea), which highlights the lack of indigenous innovation.

The subject of start-ups

• Start-ups in countries like China, the U.S., and Israel focus on solving cutting-edge problems such as:
  • Semiconductor technology
  • Refining rare earth elements with ecological sensitivity
  • Making metformin cheaper
• In contrast, the Indian government often praises new apps that mainly sell food products, which are far from the innovative start-ups seen in other nations.
• India cannot have start-ups without indigenous technology.
• Indigenous technology is impossible without indigenous science.
• Indigenous science requires quality education that is free from political agendas.
• Two-wheeler kiranas are not start-ups in the true sense of the term. They lack the innovative and technologicalaspects that define real start-ups.

Conclusion

The UGC continues to control universities, despite the Education Ministry's view. It has no justification for holding both regulatory and financial power. Can the UGC prove that changes in teaching methods and syllabus have improved industry skills and employability? India might be better off without the UGC. Leaders like UGC chairs, vice-chancellors, and ministers should focus on implementing policies and ensuring employment for youth, not pushing their agendas in the media. If they don’t, we, as independent academics, will speak up.
“When stupidity is seen as patriotism, being intelligent is unsafe.” — Isaac Asimov.