The very first post on this blog was about how people in this country are obsessed with engineering. Looking back, I feel I was rather harsh in my criticisms. It's all very well to say that most people who take up engineering are doing so because they lack a sense of direction but let me be honest with myself...even if many of these people wanted to pursue any other stream, does the Indian system give them any honourable or respectable opportunities to do so?
A recent happening prompted me to consider this matter. Having just started my final year of undergraduation, I, along with most of my classmates, am feeling extremely apprehensive about my future and my career prospects. What job opportunities does a Bachelor of Arts scholar get in this country anyway, even if he is specializing in a practical field like economics? A Master of Arts in economics obtained from an Indian institution (apart from a rare Delhi or Madras School of Economics) is about as useful as a BMTC Bus Pass in Bombay. The only option for most of us is to either attempt to get into an MBA institute or try to gain admission into a good post-graduate programme abroad.
It was while weighing the pros and cons of the latter option that I came upon this interesting piece of news. A lot of good universities in the UK actually prefer to admit mathematics, engineering or statistics students from India into their economics programmes rather than economics graduates. In other words, if two Indian students - one a mathematics major and the other an economics major - from the same college or university applied to an economics course in the UK, the mathematics major has a better chance of getting admission to the programme as compared to the economics major.
Does this make any sense? Why should the specialist be shunted aside in favour of the non-specialist? The answer is that the specialist is not really a specialist at all. Economics today is one of the most dynamic fields to study in. The position of the consumer, the producer and the government change every moment from economy to economy and time to time. Modern economics is no longer merely a Keynes vs Friedman debate revolving around conflicting ideologies of capitalism or socialism...it is now extremely result-oriented and is the nearest humanities subject to an exact science. All this revolves around intricate quantitative and analytical tools that are used daily to solve major and minor economic problems. Therefore, the knowledge of quantitative subjects such as mathematics and statisitics is vital to an economics graduate today.
And yet, to me, it seems as if this transition of economics from dismal to dynamic has been barely noted by Indian universities. To give an example, the University of Mumbai's syllabus for B.A. programme (assuming the student chooses economics) is as follows:
I Year: One Economics paper (Micro-economic theory) along with one paper each of two other humanities subjects plus two language papers
II Year: Two economics papers (Macro-economic theory and Indian Economy) along with two papers each of the same two humanities subjects plus one additional component
III Year: Advanced Economic Theory, Growth and Development and Industrial Relations along with a choice between History of Economic Thought & Econometrics, Mathematics & Research Methodology and Financial Economics and Export Management
As one can see, the average student starts learning economics deeply only when he or she reaches the final year. He or she is introduced to mathematics and econometrics only in the final year. Other special subjects are also introduced only in the final year. Does the student care? Of course not, it's final year, all that he or she is bothered about is getting enough marks in the university exams. No one wants to learn anything apart from strategies on how to do well in exams.
Net result? The student who comes out as a graduate is (unless so talented that it shows) hardly considered employable by most organizations. Far worse, foreign universities are aware of how outdated most of the syllabii in Indian universities are. This is why they prefer a mathematics major to an economics major for their economics programme - atleast they know that a top-ranking mathematics student is good at quantative subjects whereas they cannot be sure with a top-ranking economics student. Can you blame them?
The bottom line of the whole business is that most students really have no choice. There is a sort of vicious cycle going on in the Indian education system today. Most courses are badly-designed, leaving their students with inadequate skills. This prompts most people to opt for courses like engineering which offer a compartively safer prospect. This creates a huge demand for such courses, leading to their development while a social stigma develops about streams like humanities. This in turn leads to further neglect of such courses bringing in another cycle of misery for everyone.
Any chance of change? Perhaps. There are some places where humanities courses are in great demand (like Delhi). Increasing fees for engineering and medical courses are making students and their parents consider options like commerce (a classic case of demand vs supply by the way!). Chartered Accountancy and Law are both gathering immense popularity among a small group of students thanks to a number of good institutes and their reputations. All this will hopefully put the attention on the woeful condition of syllabii and course structures in unconventional fields. But there is still a long way to go.
