TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Mumbai: Opening an IIT at every corner is not the answer, said Vijay Govin-darajan, professor at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. Named one of the most important business thinkers of 2007, VG, as he is often called, suggested that a smarter way to bridge the "education gap" in the country was by "going digital".
The education gap has to be filled and it has to be filled fast, emphasised Govindarajan, speaking at a convention organised by the Association of Indian Management Schools. "India is a country with a large number of very talented people. We are good at Information Technology and we must use it to take education and healthcare to people," he said.
Taking up on an idea that has long been championed by IIT-Madras director M S Ananth, the business thinker said that one way would be to start an e-IIT, where thousands of aspiring engineers could access quality education through distance learning. Similarly, tele-medicine and mobile "Nano clinics" could change the face of rural healthcare.
The first Indian to be appointed as full-time faculty at the Harvard Business School, Govindarajan said that management education needed to go beyond the teaching of Best Practices to teaching Next Practices. Shun management orthodoxies, he exhorted the audience packed with B-school deans and faculty. "Challenge the status quo to create transformation and challenge the rules to create a revolution."
Earlier, ICICI Bank chief K V Ka-math spoke about a much needed "renaissance in reducation, from KG to high school to vocational education". Kamath pointed out the "stupendous need for people development" for an India looking upwards. We need to become "a hotbed of innovation", said Kamath. ru-