Subsidy on MTech programs to be reduced

Last week, IIT Council has taken a series of very important decisions. One of the most important decision was to reduce the subsidy on MTech programs in IITs. It was decided that over the next three years, the tuition fee will be increased to make it same as that for BTech program, which is currently, Rs. 2 lakhs per annum. The current tuition fee is Rs. 50,000 per annum. However, students who are getting an assistantship (which is almost all the students), pay only Rs. 10,000 per annum. So, for all practical purposes, the tuition fee is being hiked 20 times over the next three years. The reduction of subsidy does not stop there. It is also proposed that the financial assistance of Rs. 12,400 per month that is given to all those students who have qualified in GATE (which means pretty much all the students in IITs) will also be stopped. Of course, IITs can provide support to some students by recruiting them as Teaching Assistants, Research Project staff, etc.

When I saw the news, I thought it was a step in the right direction with some minor caveats about a proper implementation strategy. However, over the next couple of days, media quoted three IIT Directors regarding their reasons for reduction of subsidy (all three had identical reason), and I was aghast, to say the least.

They argued that a lot of people join MTech programs and then leave when they get a job. That leaves a large number of vacancies in their MTech programs which could have been used to train other interested students. And that this increase in tuition and removal of assistantship will discourage those students who are not serious about the MTech program.

Really! This is only to discourage non-serious students. Would this not discourage serious students.

Let us look at the issue of students dropping out. Most of the students drop out in the first couple of months, because of PSU jobs being offered in the months of August/September timeframe. What is the extra cost for non-serious students: Rs. 95,000 extra in tuition, and Rs. 24,800 in not getting assistantship for two months. That is roughly Rs. 1.2 lakhs. Now, let us look at serious students. They pay Rs. 95,000 extra for all four semesters, and do not get Rs. 12,400 for all 24 months. Their penalty is about Rs. 6.8 lakhs. So in order to discourage non-serious students, you put a penalty of Rs. 1.2 lakhs on non-serious students and a penalty of Rs. 6.8 lakhs on serious students. How wonderful their logic is.

Could there be other ways to handle the non-serious students. If Rs. 1.2 lakhs is all it takes to dissuade a non-serious MTech student, what about taking a deposit of Rs. 1.2 lakhs from all students, and returning the money to those who graduate in time. Make it Rs. 1.5 lakhs, if your data shows that people leave after 3-4 months.

There are other possible solutions. If you want to admit 50 students, and historically you are seeing 40% attrition, and only 30 remain, why not admit 70-80 students. Yes, some years in some departments you might end up with more than 50 students, but in a large system some small perturbations can be handled easily. This is something that I have suggested dozens of times in different meetings, social media, in my blogs, over the last decade.

There is yet another solution. Shift GATE exam. Currently, the result comes out in the second half of March. PSUs despite being requested repeatedly take their own time to recruit. What if the result was out in January or December. PSUs would have enough time to complete their recruitment before July. In most universities, the core part of the program is completed by 3rd year, and 4th year is mainly electives and projects. So holding GATE at the end of 7th semester or even in the middle of 7th semester or even at the end of 6th semester is fine. In fact, holding GATE early would help a lot of things to be done well in time. It will help PMRF recruitment, your MTech/PhD recruitment, and also many students who are confused between industry and higher studies will move towards higher studies if they get a good GATE score before they get a job.

I wonder if any of these options were considered by IIT Directors.

A reader of this blog is bound to ask me this question. If the logic of IIT Directors is so flawed, then why did I welcome this reduction of subsidy on the first day. So here are my reasons for the same (some of them were informally discussed in a meeting of Deans of Academic Affairs of various IITs more than 5 years ago):

Long time (a couple of decades) ago, the PhD programs in India were very small, particularly in Engineering. MTech students were the primary research manpower we had access to, and creating new knowledge, solving problems is important to any society. Therefore, it was important to attract the best graduates to MTech programs. The best students would not want to be dependent on their parents after completing a college degree. Hence they needed large subsidies, both in terms of reduced or no tuition, and supporting them with a stipend. Today, the times have changed. Most engineering departments have a fair number of PhD students and PhD applicants every semester.

Also, for admission to PhD programs in Engineering, most universities required an MTech degree and hence keeping that pipeline full of best students was important. No longer. Most good places today would admit students after their under-graduate degrees to the PhD program.

Whether we like it or not, MTech programs in India are not considered "higher" than BTech programs. That is, it is hugely unlikely that a BTech from an IIT will join MTech program in the same (or similar era) IIT. You mostly find BTechs from Tier 2 institutions join MTech programs in Tier 1 institutions since they want to become equal to BTechs of Tier 1 institutions. Or BTechs from Tier 3 institutions will join MTech programs in Tier 2 institutions for the same reason. This has huge value addition for them which is reflected in their placement in the job market. Since it is only a 2-year program and as a result, the costs are lower, and there is a better predictability in terms of value addition, it is easy to take an educational loan and repay it, which is not so in case of under-graduate programs. Please note that educational loans were not all that prevalent 20-30 years ago, but they are now more easily available.

Further, as of now, since all MTech students are paid a stipend, most faculty members in IITs recruit non-students as their project staff who may leave as soon as they get a job. In fact, that uncertainty is far more detrimental to our research efforts. Now, I would hope that most faculty members would like to recruit MTech students as project employees. So anyone who does not want to take a loan or be dependent on their parents and have genuine interest and capability to do research would get recruited as a project staff (except that he would have to pay all the first semester charges anyway). So even if one wanted to consider MTech as a source of research manpower, their support should have depended on the quality of their research and not be without any performance criteria. This decision will improve research projects output in IITs.

If we do not consider MTech as primary research manpower, then the obvious question is whether under-graduate education is a more important public good, or post-graduate education is more important public good. I am sure there is no doubt that first degree is more of a public good than 2nd degree and hence the subsidy should be higher for 1st degree than 2nd degree.

Of course, any service provided by a public institution should be accessible to people on the basis of their merit, and hence appropriate steps need to be taken to support those few who may come from financially weak background and are unable to afford the new tuition. How will that structure work is yet to be seen, but I am confident that IITs will come up with some model.

So I am in favor of the decision but not for the reason that IITs seem to have done it.

Added on 9/10/19

Received an anonymous email giving an interesting reason why subsidy at the current high levels should continue for MTech programs. 

Only IIT under-graduate students get really high level of subsidy. Till now, for someone who got a few marks less in JEE, there was a second chance to get similar high quality of education with high level of subsidy. Now that chance is being taken away. Should India only support those students who do well in JEE, or should others get a second chance is an important question.

My reply:

It is an important question, and certainly students in India either should have access to quality education in very large numbers, or should get multiple chances to get access to quality education if the quality is going to remain limited. But we need to look at the details of how individual IITs would implement this. In any case, the maximum tuition will be same as UG tuition. So the same level of subsidy (in fact, higher, since MTech courses may require more specialized labs) will be granted by having same tuition. The way it is likely to pan out is that one may have to bear the first semester costs without financial assistance (except that tuition waivers for SC/ST/PD and BPL families will be there, as for UG students) but from second semester onward, most students will get either TAship or RAship, which may include some stipend and tuition amount. I recall that limiting the budget drastically for financial assistance was tried in IIT Kanpur (perhaps all IITs) around late 90s. I was responsible in CSE department for raising financial support for MTech students from external sources. We raised enough sponsored projects from industry that there was not a reduction of even one student in CSE department. So I believe that students doing well in Tier 2 institutions will continue to get a reasonable chance at a low enough cost to study in Tier 1 institutions even after this.