High quality and affordable education built on viable public funding, a challenge in India, says N. Ram

The scale and financing of higher educational institutions are at the heart of the challenges faced by governments and a firm commitment to state funding is an important principle to resolve this, Hindu Group Director N. Ram said here on Wednesday.

“We must learn lessons from Europe on this issue,” said Mr. Ram, who inaugurated the India Global Education Summit 2026, jointly organized by the Government of Tamil Nadu and the National Indian Students and Alumni Union (NISAU), UK.

“Can we afford to do that, that’s a big question. I think that’s a very important factor, a strong commitment to public finance. Globally, in Scandinavia and parts of continental Europe, high-quality and affordable education systems have been built on sustainable public investment. Unfortunately in India, investment in education continues to languish at less than three per cent of GDP,” he said.

Combining quality and excellence with affordability and access for the most disadvantaged was another enduring challenge facing higher education in India.

significant gap

Reservation policies have worked in the long run, but the gap between the Scheduled Castes and Tribes and the forward communities remains significant. The hidden costs and cultural barriers faced by young women and those from rural areas in particular make it difficult for them to compete with others who come with advantages. “This is a big problem that needs to be solved,” he added.

“We need different institutional missions. Not every institution needs to be a research-intensive, global ranking-oriented university. We need to think through this, build an ecosystem that should include teaching-based universities, community colleges and high-quality liberal arts institutions,” Mr. Ram said.

Delivering the opening speech, Member of Parliament Thamizhachi Thangapandian said education in Tamil Nadu has always been political in the truest sense of the word. “It is understood as a tool to question hierarchy, eliminate inherited inequality and create opportunity that did not exist before,” he said.

Austrian Government Representative Responsible for University Rankings and Governor of Austrian University Helmut Kern said that India combines sustainable demographic momentum with scale, unlike countries with shrinking demographics such as China, Japan and Korea. Prof. Kern added that by 2024, 155 million people in the 18 to 23 age group will live in India.

Tamil Nadu Higher Education Secretary P. Shankar said that the highlight of the Summit will be the inauguration of Tamil Nadu Knowledge City, India’s first integrated global education and innovation institution. Dr. Shankar added that this represents a new model in which universities do not operate separately, but as part of an industry-academia collaboration ecosystem. While NISAU founder and president Sanam Aurora determined the content of the two-day talks, Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation (TIDCO) chairman Sandhya Venugopal Sharma and TIDCO managing director Sandeep Nanduri spoke.