Chief Minister of Kerala Pinarayi Vijayan said in Kochi on Friday, December 16, that while the issue of large outflow of students from Kerala to foreign countries for higher education is a cause for concern, it's not as worrying as being projected because the state is taking concrete steps to draw students to universities in the state.
Speaking at a workshop on the topic Knowledge Translation (KT) Cross-disciplinary National Conference & Hands-on Workshop, the Chief Minister also made the point that the growing number of students opting to study abroad is not restricted to Kerala and that other states experience a similar problem. He stated that the state government is taking steps to strengthen the research ecosystem in higher education. He was delivering an address during the inauguration of the two-day workshop that the Kerala State Higher Education Council organised at Cochin University of Science and Technology (CUSAT), as reported by The New Indian Express.
The topic of Haryana students travelling abroad for higher education was also raised at a recent gathering of Chief Ministers (CMs) called by the Prime Minister, said Pinarayi. "Haryana is close to Delhi, and despite that, if students are going overseas for higher education, skipping higher educational institutions in the capital, it means we need to make centres of higher education even more attractive," he said. He also said that the state government is working to improve the research ecosystem to attract students from other states as well as students from Kerala. The CM pointed out that the government had decided to award post-doctoral fellowships to 150 candidates, but it could only provide the fellowships to 70 students owing to a lack of candidates in the research field. The initial plan was to give post-doctoral fellowships to 500 people, as reported by The New Indian Express. "We need to beef up our research areas," he said.
P Rajeeve, Minister for Law, Industries and Coir brought another aspect to the issue of students going abroad for higher studies. "Earlier we would never ask the students the country where they are headed to. We would ask them which universities they are joining. Is it Oxford, Yale, Cambridge, MIT or Harvard? Now, we never know which college they are going. The students would just say he's going to the UK, for a degree course. We would never even know which course too," he said.
There are other reasons for people to migrate abroad, according to the minister. He cited recent reports that a large number of people had renounced and given up their Indian citizenship in this regard. He added, "So we cannot see this development in isolation,” as reported by The New Indian Express.
