Will Bangalore Make Its Mark As A 'Education Hub'

If India is to attract more students and institutions from foreign countries, then setting up legitimate educational hubs with the support of the Government is imperative to achieve the goal. This being one of the ideas tossed around at a conference on higher education on Wednesday, it asks the question, Can Bangalore become one-stop answer to all educational institutions in the country.

Professor KB Powar, Chancellor of DY Patil University at the conference organized by the Educational Promotion Society for India said "We need educational hubs to attract foreign students. We need it because we could use more capital and know-how. Educational hubs will enrich the higher education system because the government is not doing much in that end. There are cities such as Bangalore, Hyderabad and Pune that have a large concentration of Universities and institutes. They are metro cities and can be developed into hubs. Especially as Bangalore also has a number of research institutes, it can also become a research hub for the country".

"Moreover, Education hubs could be developed along the lines of what is found in countries like Malaysia and Singapore. In Malaysia, specific cities have a number of Universities and Institutes. In the same way, Qatar in Dubai has a strong concentration of Institutes. These hubs are financed by Private players but need the government to develop the right strategies", he added.

Professor MS Thimmappa, the former VC of Bangalore University welcomes the idea of Bangalore being converted into an educational hub saying that the city is ideal for the setting.

"We cant' ask international institutes to come to India and not provide them with incentives. We need to remove the number of restrictions that have been put on these institutes. They can bring in the Know-how and we can develop the infrastructure locally. The strict provisions that are present in the Foreign Education Providers Bill should be relaxed" added Powar.

When you look at Bangalore you will see that it houses the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Indian Institute of Management (IIM-B), the CV Raman Institute, JNCASR, the National Law School. However, rarely do the faculty of, say Bangalore University or Mysore University interact with institutes like IISc. But they have many departments in common. So, if there was exchange in faculty, equipment, sharing of research conducted or interaction between the students, it would provide the students greater exposure", he briefs out.

What's your opinion about this? Will Bangalore, the Garden City also prove to be an Educational city too. What say?