Draft report of

3.4.4 State Universities
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on HRD in its 172^nd Report has recommended that this ceiling on Plan expenditure is nearly unrealistic and it desires that the UGC should increase this ceiling so that development of infrastructure in the universities could be taken up with a view to improving the quality of our institutions of higher learning.

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  The State Universities constitute a crucial segment within the higher education system in India, both in quantitative terms as well as in their contribution to the promotion of quality research and teaching. Today we have 217 State universities. The following measures are suggested: -
  

- Colleges affiliated with state universities and located in backward regions of the country should be strengthened by UGC.

- Assistance should be provided for setting up of B.Ed faculty in college/university at each district headquarter.
- Grants should be provided for joint research programmes.
- Broadband connectivity should be provided for all State Universities.
- Measures are adopted to continue funding for new faculty posts for state universities beyond the plan period.
- Quality growth in the affiliated colleges, which take the entire responsibility of conducting the undergraduate program of their respective universities, must be regarded as an integral component of the development program of the State universities.
- Since the development of State universities cannot take place without a concomitant development of its affiliated colleges, there is a need to embark on a new project to create and fund teaching posts and provide research grants to college teachers.
- The UGC’s Inflibnet System needs to be expanded to cover all State universities. The same facilities should be made available to the affiliated colleges, especially those colleges that offer post-graduate courses.
- Planned efforts should be made to create facilities for teachers and research students of the State universities to enable them to become internationally more knowledgeable by way of providing opportunities to them to become more exposed to international collaborative programmes and identifying international partners in research.
- Additional financial support for these schemes should be forthcoming from the UGC to reduce the burden of tuition fees paid by students for such courses.
- Academic Staff Colleges in State universities need to be strengthened.
- Resources need to be earmarked for State universities for strengthening Distance/Open and e learning as an integrated activity within the university system.