A senior professor at Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A) has questioned the need for autonomy in the premier management institutes. Professor TT Ram Mohan in his book “Brick by Red Brick” has argued that absence of government will evade a sense of accountability from the institutes. He fears that IIMs may become "teaching shops" without government funds and monitoring.
"It is often asked why the government cannot exit the boards of IIMs and leave things entirely to eminent professionals as it happens in the corporate world.... Any government withdrawal would create a dangerous governance vacuum with adverse implications for the very character of the IIMs," says Ram Mohan in his soon to be published book.
The issue of autonomy is decade-long and it has gained momentum in recent times with IIMs pitching hard for greater autonomy. The institutes argued autonomy would help them pay better salaries, attract foreign faculties and assist in setting up overseas campuses.
In case of IIM-A the institute was at loggerheads with the HRD ministry headed by Murli Manohar Joshi in the early part of 2000 and its then director Bakul Dholakia continuously fought against the government interference as claimed by him. He once said in one of his interviews: ".. for institutes of higher education to excel globally, withstand the pressures of global competition, they require ideological, financial and operational autonomy."
The present IIM-A director Samir Barua has also been insistent on autonomy and said in his convocation address that the institute must be free of all government controls to compete with foreign Bschools.
"The contention that there is a government devil out there that has smothered autonomy and that, absent this devil, IIM-A would have become truly world class, lacks substance. Over the first four decades, starting from the days of Sarabhai (founder Vikram Sarabhai) and Matthai, no director at IIM-A had any serious complaint about lack of autonomy.... The clamour for autonomy in recent years must be seen for what it is: a thinly-disguised attempt to escape the checks and balances inherent in the government system and enter a lawless paradise made possible by a dysfunctional and ineffectual board," he adds.
The issue of autonomy only came up in IIM-A when the institute stopped taking government grants eight years ago. Ram Mohan believes to avoid government aid, IIM-A has been heavily relying on in-company training conducted by its faculty for the corporate world. This activity has been helping the institute generate a significant portion it's annual revenue. "It thus sees such revenues as crucial to its autonomy... Institutions that rely entirely on internally generated revenues end up as teaching shops," he says.
"Trying to cover costs mainly through revenue-generating programmes is the road to perdition," he says suggesting institutes should look at philanthropy and private funds to meet their requirements.
Prof. Ram Mohan worked extensively in consultancy and in the financial sector before entering academics. He has carried out consulting assignments in India as well as in the Gulf and the Middle East. Prof. Ram Mohan specialises in the financial sector. His current research interests include banking sector reforms, privatisation and corporate governance. He has run training programmes for bank executives and given talks on issues in the Indian banking sector at various for a. He was Visiting Faculty at Stern School of Business, NYU in the summer of 2001. In June 2002, he was appointed Member, Technical Advisory Committee on Money and Government Securities Markets, Reserve Bank of India.
[Source: Economic Times]
