Institutions of Eminence (IoE): Accelerate granting of IoE status

March 29, 2023

Why in News?

A Parliamentary panel has sought status notes on the 2 public and 5 private higher education institutions which await the final IoE status, recommending that the process for granting the IoE status be “accelerated”.
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports, has also recommended that the IoE scheme be realigned with the National Education Policy 2020.

What’s in Today’s Article?

What is the Institutes of Eminence (IoE) Scheme?

The Union Budget 2016-17 announced the Government of India’s commitment to empower the Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs).
- For this, 10 public and 10 private institutions are to be identified to emerge as world-class Teaching and Research Institutions.
Accordingly, the University Grant Commission (UGC) - a statutory body under the Ministry of Education launched the IoE scheme in 2017.
The scheme aims:
- To provide for higher education leading to excellence and innovations.
- To engage in areas of specialisation to make distinctive contributions to the objectives of the university education system.
- To provide for high quality teaching and research in unique and emerging areas of knowledge, including interdisciplinary areas.
- To enable HEIs to be rated as top 100 institutions in the world over time.

What are the Benefits of the IoE Scheme?

Greater administrative and academic autonomy: For example, these HEIs are -
- Free to decide their fee for domestic and foreign students.
- They will have a flexible course duration and structure.
- They will be exempt from approvals of the government or UGC for academic collaborations with foreign institutions. However, institutions based on a list of negative countries prepared by the External Affairs and Home ministries will be exceptions.
More financial support:
- The 10 selected public institutions will get Rs 1,000 crore each from the Ministry of Education to achieve world-class status (no financial assistance to the private institutions).

What are the Criteria to get the IoE Status?

The Institutions should be among:
- Top 50 in the National lnstitute Ranking Framework (NIRF) in their category
- Top 500 in internationally recognised rankings like the Times Higher Education World University Rankings, etc.
- The Public Institutes that are eligible to apply under IoE are as follows:
  - Central Universities,
  - Government-owned and controlled Deemed to be Universities,
  - lnstitutions of National lmportance such as IITs, NITs, etc.
  - State Universities set up under a law made by the Legislative Assembly of a State.
Procedure to be followed:

These institutes need to submit a proposal providing their action plan along with milestones (they plan to achieve over the next 5 to 15 years) and timelines to the Empowered Expert Committee (EEC constituted by UGC).
The Ministry of Education will assign the IoE status tag on the basis of the appraisal report (sent by the EEC).

Revocation of the IoE status:
- All such facilities shall however be subject to the objective of becoming a university of international repute at the end of the fifth and subsequent years.
- In case they fail, the EEC could penalise them to the extent of revoking their eminence tag and reverting them back to their original status (final action on revocation to be taken by the Ministry of Education).

News Summary Regarding the Parliamentary Panel’s Report on IoE Status:

The recommendations are a part of the report on the Demand for Grants for 2023-24 of the committee.
The government informed the committee that so far eight public and four private institutes (total - 12) have been granted the IoE status.
- The 8 public institutes have been sanctioned Rs 3,428 crore so far since the launch of the scheme in 2017, with IISc Bangalore accounting for the highest share with Rs 620.59 crore.
The committee said that the absence of an EEC (yet to be notified by the Centre) is holding up the process of granting IoE status.