Public Financing and Deregulated Fees in Indian Higher Education

Contents: Foreword. 1. Introduction. 2. Analysis of public expenditure in higher education. 3. Fiscal constraints and deregulated fee structure. 4. Tuition fee policies and regulation. 5. Tuition fee policy and experiences in international perspective. 6. Self financing courses: university level analysis. 7. Analysis of self financing courses in colleges. 8. Students and faculties feedbacks. 9. Fees and financing of collaborative. 10. Diversified approaches to financing higher education. Conclusion. References.

Fully subsidized higher education is under strain, as public funding has not grown in proportion to the growth in enrolment. This has brought the issue of fees at the forefront of debate. The resource constraint has forced public supported institutions to introduce self financing courses. On the other hand, private institutions of higher education have been charging fees to recover full costs. There is thus shift in the burden of paying costs of higher education upon students. It has implications on the access, equity and quality of higher education.

The book presents a historical background and international scenario in which the deregulated fee regime has come to be established. Lack of a rational fee structure based on the principles of efficiency and equity hassled to a duality in fees regular programmes run on a low tuition fee basis and self-financing programmes on a full cost recovery basis. Thus differentiated fee structure has emerged as important characteristics of higher education. An empirical over view of the level and structure of fees is presented in the book.

The book highlights the point that students are guided by the future returns from education in relation to costs. It argues that there is a need to explore the diversified approach to finance higher education. The book observes that household cost of education other than fees is important and there is a need to subsidise food, housing, transport and learning resource for ensuring access of the poor sections of the society. Lastly, it is recommended that government should establish a fee regulatory authority to regulate fees in higher education.