Osmania University - What is the future?

At the beginning of this piece let me say one thing. I am always indebted and will remain indebted to Osmania University, which is not only my place of work, but also my alma mater. My debt is derived out of the fact that it is the one institution that has given my employment as a teacher, a position that I quite badly wanted. My work experience, like almost anybody else's in any field, has been a mixed bag. I have had the opportunity to teach some really interested and sincere students and some indifferent ones. However, the last couple of years have been more upbeat than at any other time. There are many reasons for that. One of them is that I had an opportunity to serve the university in its attempt to generate tie ups with other well known academic institutions of the country and also to participate in the preparation of proposals when the university was looking for higher levels of funding based on its activities. More than all this what gave a great deal of pleasure was my teaching experience which involved not just the local students but foreign ones as well.

The last few years have seen a quantum increase in the number of foreign students in Osmania University. Even though Osmania University is seen as a local university, and it is, catering mainly to the students of the region of Telangana, it has always looked and has been different from other local/regional universities, such as Andhra University (the other big university in the State of Andhra Pradesh), Kakatiya University, Sri Venkateswara University etc. The reason is simple. Its location. It being located in Hyderabad has made a huge difference to what it has been. Hyderabad itself is a cosmopolitan city and this feature of Hyderabad's has found itself even in the Osmania University, which ultimately became a microcosm of Hyderabad, which again was a microcosm of India. It has been a premier institution of higher learning and even today many of its alumni can be found in different parts of the world in different capacities such as university professors, engineers and even CEOs of global corporations. This had given Osmania University a great reputation and I could see it myself, when I had applied for my PhD in universities in the UK. I remember getting letters from Oxford (this was in the mid 1990's) and Cambridge which categorically stated that in order to be eligible for admission there one had to come from good universities in India such as the Central Universities or from Osmania University, Calcutta University or Madras University, in that exact order. It is sad that the university does not enjoy that status anymore. There are reasons for that.

First of all with the establishment of the University of Hyderabad (a Central University) most of the urban students of Hyderabad started seeking admission in that university. What attracted people to that university was the fact that it had a more contemporary curriculum and a more rigorous academic schedule which was rarely ever disrupted. The Osmania University on the other hand has always been more political and has had its academics disturbed for various reasons a couple of times. But the more important factor was the recruitment of bad teachers in the aftermath of the first separate Telangana agitation. The politics of patronage to certain sections that one found in the politics of the state found themselves mirrored in the recruitment of faculty members in the Osmania University. I have talked about this in previous posts where I have said faculty positions were brazenly given to undeserving people without the slightest of hesitation. Over a period of time the faculty went from bad to worse. A parallel development has been the opening up of more specialized universities for engineering, agriculture and even other central universities such as the English and Foreign Languages University and the Maulana Abul Kalaam National Urdu University. This meant that more of the urban students went to these universities or simply to other universities in the country such as the Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi and the University of Delhi. This slowly reduced Osmania to taking in students only from the rural areas of the Telangana region, which is not a bad thing at all. They too are students and need education and opportunity to do well in life.

But one thing went very wrong. The incompetent among the teaching faculty used the lack of acquaintance with English among the rural students as an excuse to dilute curricula and teaching. A lot of rubbish was justified in the name of rural students and their inability to cope with difficult things. And most of these teachers have never been outside of Osmania University so they did not have a wide view of the world. At a juncture like this the arrival of foreign students meant a good thing. For one there was pressure on the teachers to brush up their knowledge and teaching skills, while providing a window to different parts of the world and other cultures. A foreign student told me that some students had asked him if they speak Hindi in Tajikistan. He was not offended, but only explained what their language was (Persian) and also other aspects of their culture. Foreign students have also been celebrating their national days such as Independence days and their festivals giving everybody an insight into their cultures. Therefore, the last few years have been more vibrant than ever in the recent past and this has benefitted not only the Indian student but also teachers such as me. Now with the agitation and with politicians yet again interfering in academics, I am worried. If an academic year is disrupted or lost, I foresee a situation where foreign students (at least the good ones) not choosing to come to Osmania University. Today the university attracts students from Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kazhakstan, Iran, Iraq, Malaysia, Japan, Mozambique, Kenya and Tanzania among many other countries. If these students go to other universities instead of Osmania, it will be a great loss for the students and teachers since we all lose these windows which allow us to look into the other parts of the world. The university will survive, no doubt about that, but I would think it would be great if it thrives than merely surviving. I have my fingers crossed. Hopefully, sense will prevail and the good process of the last few years will continue. Amen to that.