Launched in 2013, Rashtriya Uchchtar Shiksha Abhiyan is a scheme sponsored by the central government for proffering strategic finance and funding to eligible state universities of India. The scheme emphasizes the fact that the most important lessons are learned outside of a classroom; be it libraries or computer labs, promoting autonomous institutes or consolidating their strength to form cluster universities.

Objectives

Rashtriya Uchchtar Shiksha Abhiyan aims at improving the overall quality of state universities by ensuring their conformity to norms and standards. The scheme reforms affiliation, academic and examination systems, and quality faculty and capacity building at employment levels.

The scheme envisions to create an atmosphere that promotes research and innovation among students and widen institutional/university base by boosting institutional capacity.

Regional imbalances are rectified and eliminated by establishing institutes/universities in unserved and underserved regions.

Moreover, this Abhiyan has been implemented to improve equity at higher educational levels by proffering educational opportunities to SC/STs and socially and educationally backward classes of society, promoting women’s education, and including minority classes and people with special needs.

Components

Primary components covered under the scheme are as follows:

  1. Establishing universities by upgrading existing autonomous colleges, conversing colleges into a cluster, and upgrading existing degree colleges to model colleges
  2. Enriching quality and excellence in state-level universities and autonomous colleges
  3. Improving research, innovation, and overall quality of education
  4. Ensuring restructuring, capacity building, and national higher education resource centers

Highlights

Rashtriya Uchchtar Shiksha Abhiyan plans to increase the gross enrolment ratio of India to 30% by the year 2020.

In the second phase of the scheme, i.e., 2017–2020, a total of 70 model degree colleges and eight professional colleges will be established; for this phase a budget of Rs. 7100 crore has been allocated.

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