I don’t know how many million words have been written discussing ideas to reform higher education (HE) in Nepal. I know for sure that I have written many dozen columns over the last 15 years highlighting various aspects of what could be done to make our HE scene better than what it has been in recent years.

With respect to the ideas that have been proposed in the public domain, we can say that they can be bunched together in two clusters. The first group of ideas for reforms in the HE sector demands clarity and commitment at the top national level. The second group of ideas for reforms—about which I have written often—demands action at the institutional and individual levels.

Many of my previous columns have discussed how universities, independent research entities, individual academics or groups of academics could enhance the everyday functions of Nepali HE through committed applications of some basic ideas. In expressing how those basic ideas could be implemented, I have tried to highlight the fact that one can do quite a bit without waiting for the national scene to improve all at once. In fact, in saying as much, I have tried to suggest—and this has also been emphasised by many others including Prof Chaitanya Mishra in his commentary in the most recent volume of the journal Samaj Adhyayan—that reforming HE in Nepal is a recursive process that must start at the top and the bottom simultaneously.

Today, I focus on the first group of ideas for reforms that need to happen at the top national level. These calls highlight the need for a HE policy for a federal Nepal and clarity on the ways through which universities are established. They also demand more efficient investments in this sector through targeted allocations to universities and the creation of mechanisms through which research by independent entities can be supported through public funds, a phenomenon I have written about already by demanding that a Nepali social science council be established (May 12, 2023).

A new policy

Let us ask what kind of HE policy we need. Such policy statements have been produced in the past. Take, for instance, the HE Policy 2015 published by the University Grants Commission. I don’t know about others, but I find such documents to be wordy and not particularly helpful in executing reforms in the HE sector. Such documents tend to be excessively aspirational in that they try to cover everything but do not clear the fundamental confusions in the field. Hence, I do not think we need another long document as federal Nepal’s HE policy. Instead, we need clarity and agreement on a bunch of related themes that can be stated in a short policy statement.

First, such a policy needs to acknowledge a fundamental point regarding what needs to happen at the top national level. Here is the point: Without an end to the interference by political parties in the running of our universities, nothing much can be improved. As many of us have written countless times already, the dispensing of political patronage as bhagbanda is shared by all the major political parties. Under this spoils-sharing regime, Nepali universities have become susceptible to interventions from all kinds of political parties and their fraternal organisations. As I wrote earlier (January 20, 2023), this practice has resulted in our universities becoming hostage to higher management personnel who disagree on the fundamentals of everyday university management. Hence, a general agreement among all the political parties to stop the bhagbanda practice should be the first item in such a policy. Without this agreement, any HE policy is useless in the present context.

Second, such a policy needs to dispel the perceived hierarchy between “central” and “provincial” universities. Let me explain. Once the federalism debate started to pick up speed in Nepal after 2007, there were studies commissioned to figure out what designations should be given to already existing universities. Some of these reports suggested that among the existing universities, some should be designated as “central” universities and others should be declared as “provincial” universities. But as representatives of all the universities that had been legislatively given birth by the Parliament of pre-federal Nepal made clear, none of them was interested in becoming anything less than “central” university. So that differential designation exercise hit a dead-end pretty soon.

Fast forward to 2015. The Constitution of Nepal promulgated that year made clear that new universities could be established via legislation passed through either the federal Parliament or the seven Provincial Assemblies. Taking advantage of this provision, the assembly of Gandaki Province passed a relevant act in 2019, and several other provinces have followed suit. Hence, at the moment, many proposed universities are hoping to come online through legislation passed either by the federal Parliament or the Provincial Assemblies. The HE policy needs to make it absolutely clear that whatever the legislative gestation pathway, there is no functional hierarchy between universities born out of the federal and provincial legislatures.

Process clarity

Third, the HE policy needs to make it absolutely clear the process through which applications to start new universities will be entertained both at the federal and provincial levels. Better transparency in this process will obviate the need for individuals who want to start new universities to be obsequious to the supreme neta of this or that political party. This will surely contribute to an environment in which full autonomy can be subsequently exercised by the new universities.

Fourth, although the federal government can sponsor new universities, the HE policy should prioritise their founding via the province-legislated route. This prioritisation will force our provinces to be innovative in exercising plural mechanisms through which new universities are founded. Instead of following the path exercised by Gandaki Province (namely, its decision to establish Gandaki University as a province-owned and financed university), the provinces should be encouraged to come up with legislative frameworks that produce a variety of universities that are not owned and funded by the provinces themselves. Instead, such frameworks should encourage wide constellations of stakeholders to come together to start new universities as public-private collaborative ventures.

Fifth, the HE policy should make clear the criteria for financially supporting existing and new universities across the country. Public funding for existing universities will have to be tied to performance indicators (here I am not talking only about numerical metrics). More importantly, building upon the fourth point above, our HE policy should promote province-legislated not-for-profit private universities in which the provinces assume very little or no financial liability regarding recurring costs. This means education entrepreneurs and provincial governments will have to negotiate good deals. For instance, a provincial government and the concerned local governments might have to provide land on lease, construct necessary supporting infrastructure (for example, a road to the university campus) and even provide some capital expenditure subsidies or guarantees. In return, they can demand lower tuition fees for students who are permanent residents of that particular province. In other words, the seven provinces can compete with each other to attract education entrepreneurs to their provinces by offering attractive packages. Such a HE policy would be beneficial to the realisation of an actually functioning federal Nepal.