Where are the teachers for new schools/colleges?

The Budget has so many plans to boost education in India. Apart from AIIMS in J&K, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, HP and Assam, an apprentice training institute for women in Uttarakhand, accrediting ISM Dhanbad with IIT status and coming up with new IIMs in J&K and AP, the Budget seems to be going all out.

There are two schools of thought – one which supports the launch of more new IITs and IIMs to make it accessible to more number of students and another school of thought does not support the making of IITs and IIM into a ‘mass course’, where too many of these colleges would go on to dilute their value and credibility.

But all these questions apart, the biggest question is – do we have trained teachers and professors? As such India is dealing with a shortage of good quality teachers and even principals/deans to head institutions are becoming difficult to come by. If the quality of teachers itself is a suspect then what quality of education are we really talking about. As such India has earned a reputation of ‘unemployable’ educated youth and if we keep on increasing new schools without good teachers, will education really empower? Why is it that the Modi Govt cannot think out-of-the-box and instead of increasing the same old schools, pave way to establish a new school, something like an IIT or IIM which trains the highest quality of teachers and professors? An IIT for training world class teachers is an urgent need, hope the Govt wakes up to this reality soon.