A Reform Agenda for Mr. Sibal

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The HRD minister needs to divert his political capital to tackling the reform of college and university education.

When the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) II announced Kapil Sibal as its human resource development (HRD) minister, the advocates of higher education reform were delighted. Two of his predecessors - Murli Manohar Joshi and Arjun Singh - had been stubbornly opposed to all reforms. The higher education system in India could not afford yet one more anti-reform HRD minister.
Under the guiding hand of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, his reformist finance minister Yashwant Sinha had worked to implement economic reforms in virtually all sectors of the economy. But when it came to higher education, the dynamic duo could not budge the wall that was Joshi. The sector met the same fate under Arjun Singh during the UPA-I rule.