Sometimes timing dictates the definition of news. Home minister P. Chidambaram delivered an important speech at a function organized by the Intelligence Bureau. Though Chidambaram called for a break-up of the home ministry, the speech attracted only routine coverage. Then, the government announced that M.K. Narayanan would step down as National Security Advisor. Because Chidambaram had talked about a new counter-terrorism mechanism, the speech was treated as a call to abolish the NSA’s post. Suddenly, it became the lead news story.

   In the process, another one of Chidambaram’s speeches was completely ignored though perhaps the positions it set forward were even more far-reaching and controversial than the points he had made in his address to the Intelligence Bureau. Given that we are currently in the midst of a debate about the direction and nature of higher education – one symptom is the de-recognition of several deemed universities run by crooks, politicians and businessmen – Chidambaram’s intervention represented an unusually strong policy statement.

   Chidambaram spoke at the convocation of St Xavier’s College, Calcutta, on January 17. He began by demolishing the general view that Indians are fans of higher education. He pointed out that less than 12 per cent of school-going children were able to find place in colleges or universities. The world average is 45 per cent.

   Given that there is a shortage of places in higher education institutions, how do we fill the gap? Chidambaram claimed that “Higher education – or what passes as higher education in India – is, save a few shining examples, either a money-spinning business or a moth-eaten system.”

   He said that higher educational institutions fell into three categories. There were government-run universities. He was scathing about them: “They are no different from any government office. As a matter of tiresome duty, they produce graduates and post-graduates every year, the vast majority of whom are no more ‘educated’ at the end of their terms than they were when they first enrolled in the college or university.”

   A second group consists of elitist institutions, run with the support of the government. He conceded that these were often well-run but attacked them on the grounds of elitism.

   It was the third set of institutions that drew most of his ire: “For them, education is commerce. Since demand for seats and colleges far exceeded the supply through legitimate sources there was a huge business opportunity that was grabbed with both hands by shrewd business persons. The bulk of these self-financing colleges and self-styled universities are no more than money-spinning businesses that exploit the demand-supply gap.”

   Given the contempt in Chidambaram’s tone, nobody will be surprised by what came next: “I recognize and support the role of the private sector in higher education. But I am absolutely clear in my mind that the private sector in higher education ought not to mean private business in education. No one should be allowed to profit from offering higher education. As far as I am aware, no great university in the world was established for the purpose of profit. I believe some activities in a society must stand outside the world of profit and higher education ranks first amongst such activities.”

   Chidambaram’s conclusion was unambiguous. He hoped that when the higher education policy was formulated “we will be able to ensure that higher education is a domain that will have no place for profiteering”.

   Though the speech was largely ignored, it was actually one of the most important speeches on the subject of education made by any member of the second UPA government. For the past several months, HRD minister Kapil Sibal has been striving to reform the education sector with, it must be said, very little support from his government.

   I do not know if Sibal supports Chidambaram’s views in their entirety but I do know that he is concerned by the number of colleges and institutes that cheat students by making false promises and then profit from exploiting the gullibility of the young. Sibal seems to believe that the lust for profit has led many institutions to defraud students and wants to set in place a regulatory mechanism that actually works.

   Chidambaram appears to have gone beyond anything Sibal has said in public. His view is that no institution of learning should be run on a profit basis. Presumably, he would require that all such institutions were run by charitable trusts or by non-profit organizations.

   In fact, as we know, education (like health) is seen as a growth sector by businessmen who believe that there are huge profits in running nasty elite schools and much-hyped institutes and colleges. Such businessmen believe that a pro-liberalisation government will encourage investment-for-profit in the education sector. So, the words of Chidambaram, the government’s key liberaliser, will come as a shock to them.

   We have no way of knowing whether Chidambaram cleared the contents of his speech with the Prime Minister or with the leaders of his party. What we do know, however, is that his views are almost certainly shared by Sonia Gandhi and many of his party’s leaders who agree with him that Harvard, Oxford, Yale or the Sorbonne would not be what they are today if they were run on a profit-making basis.

   All this suggests that Sibal’s removal of deemed university status from many profit-making institutions is merely the first step in a new policy initiative. When the government does announce its policy on higher education, there will be no role for institutions that are run on a commercial basis.

   Speaking for myself, I share Chidambaram’s contempt for those who seek to profit from the education of our children. Even in that bastion of capitalism, the United States, college education is not run on a purely commercial basis by corporations or individuals who make money out of their students. The higher education system of a successful society must be based on something more than the greed of people who set up colleges.

   My problem is that, as much as I disapprove of education as a money-making racket, I recognize that the new institutions have plugged a gap in the supply of college places. If we are to drive out the profiteers and we are to raise our percentages of college-going youth, then we cannot do so by depending solely on the government whose institutions Chidambaram so eloquently damned in the same speech.

   We need to evolve a new model of higher education that may well use government financing but which functions without governmental corruption and inertia. As of now, no model exists that fits the bill.

   So yes, do ban colleges that are run for profit. But let’s first make sure that we have something to put in their place.