Rajya Sabha saw repeated disruptions and could not take up scheduled business for the day.
In Lok Sabha, the Indian Institutes of Management Bill was passed.
Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) are currently registered as Societies under the Societies Registration Act, 1860. As they are not established by an Act of a legislature or deemed to be a university, they cannot grant degrees. The Bill changes this and confers them the power to grant degrees. It will enable IIMs to grant degrees such as MBA instead of PGDM and PhDs instead of Fellowships.
During the debate, members across political parties supported the Bill. The Bill extends autonomy to IIMs in areas such as the appointment of the Chairperson of the Board of Governors, the Director, using the institute’s funds and providing variable pay to the Director. Members participating in the debate welcomed the enhanced autonomy and asked the Minister if this is a roadmap to extend greater autonomy to other higher educational institutions of national importance or other institutions of higher education such as IITs and AIIMS. To know more about the details of the change of autonomy from the current functioning of IIMs to the proposed Bill you can read our analysis here.
Members, however, did raise some concerns about reservation for teaching staff and student placement; vacancies at the post of Directors in the institutes and other teaching staff, need to control fees, need to encourage research in management studies and other such issues.
Private Member Business was taken up after the passage of the Bill.
Lok Sabha was sitting at the time of sending this report.