HEFA will fastrack research & academic infrastructure dev. : Javadekar

Speed Post News Network

New Delhi : Union Minister for Human Resource Development Prakash Javadekar on July 5, 2018, said that the cabinet decision to approve the proposal for enlarging the scope of Higher Education Financing Agency (HEFA) by expanding its capital base to Rs 10,000 crore and tasking it to mobilise Rs 1,00,000 crore for revitalizing infrastructure and systems in education (RISE) by 2022 is a very big step to boost the education sector.

Addressing a presser in New Delhi today, Javadekar said that HEFA is the vision of Prime Minister  Narendra Modi for providing additional finance for promoting research and academic infrastructure in the higher educational institutions, according to a PIB release.

Giving more details, the Minister said that the increase of allocation for education from Rs 65,867 Crore in 2013-14 to Rs 1,10,000 crore in 2018-19 (67% increase) is without any raise in fee. An amount of Rs 22,000 crore would be mobilised in the current year by HEFA depending on the actual requirement. He further said State-of-the-art labs and research facilities will help in retaining the brightest young minds in India and will attract Overseas Citizens of India back to Indian universities which will convert brain drain to brain gain.

The Minister highlighted that project based funding brings greater discipline in selection and execution of projects. There will be no burden on the new institutions as the Government will take the entire burden of servicing the loans and there will be no increase in student fees on account of this project.