Opinion Indian higher education institutions need to be prepared for the churn created by Trump's crackdown on US universities

Indian Express

25-04-2025

The ongoing confrontation between the Trump administration and virtually all of America's prominent research universities is unprecedented. US universities face challenges on several fronts. Among them is a massive reduction in what universities are allowed to charge as overheads for administering research grants, an important source of funding. The abrupt cancellation of visas of several foreign students on minor grounds, with the threat of more to come, has added further pressure. America's flagship research funding agencies, among them the NSF, NIH and NEH, have slashed their grants, reflecting the Trump administration's new financial priorities.
What does this mean for India? Indian students made up the highest number of overall international enrollments in the US universities, at 29.4 per cent in 2024-25. India has maintained its position as the top sender of international graduate students to the US for the second year running.
Both public and private higher education institutions in India should now expect applications from students who would otherwise have headed abroad, concerned about being able to complete their degrees (Initial reports suggest a more than 30 per cent decline in applications to US universities). Such institutions should also expect increased interest in transfers, from students worried that a minor misdemeanour might lead to their being asked to self-deport.
But further upheavals might also be in store. Faculty members in the USA who retain citizenship of their home countries have become aware of the precarity of their immigration status under the new regime. The declining tolerance for diversity along multiple axes is a concerning development. Decoding irreversible shifts from temporary realignments isn't easy.
But would we have enough jobs to be able to accommodate the best of those who might think of returning? This seems unlikely, and not just in India. The leading mathematician and Fields medalist Terence Tao recently said, 'One could argue that any 'brain drain' from the US would simply result in an equal and opposite 'brain gain' in other countries, but … in practice, the rest of the world would not be able to absorb all of the lost opportunities in the US in a single job cycle'.
One cannot but be pessimistic about India's ability to turn the current turmoil to its advantage. Many public institutions have relatively small numbers of positions to hire into, if they do so at all. Mechanisms for hiring are archaic, opaque, time-consuming and often politicised. In virtually every university department, faculty members have little to no input about candidates to be hired, with this job being that of an all-powerful external selection committee. The constitution of the selection committee, a prerogative of Vice Chancellors, is often the key to appointing 'desirable' candidates. Private institutions, perhaps, have more flexibility, but working conditions and salaries are variable.
The Chinese model of targeting and making attractive offers to high-quality faculty, largely those trained in the US system but with roots in China, is credited with the current high quality of institutions in the country. A 2025 Nature Index methodology ranking physics research showed that China dominated the top 10 list, with only two non-Chinese institutions in that list.
However, the difference between Chinese and Indian investment in higher education is staggering. As Ramgopal Rao, the former Director of IIT Delhi, has pointed out, what China spends on just two of its major universities is the entire higher education budget of India.
Incentivising faculty members abroad who wish to return by giving them a choice of universities to return to, while their salaries are underwritten by the Centre, is a possibility. The recently announced Vaibhav Fellowships are a first step towards this.
But to base our actions on what we might do solely with the idea of attracting foreign academics to return would be meaningless if we cannot also re-imagine our universities and make them more rewarding institutions with attractive intellectual environments. We need more institutions. We also need to make our existing ones larger and better. We need more eyes on India, including its public health, culture, society and biodiversity. This is an opportunity for India to build institutions that can be intellectual leaders for the Global South.
We need structural changes in the functioning of all our institutions of higher education, changes that will ensure academic independence as well as the highest standards. Changing how these institutions are assessed is needed, as is more public accountability and transparency in how they function.
We should also look beyond STEMM programmes, since the world of the future will require diverse skills. A broad liberal education, provided by universities in the true sense and not purely technical institutions, is key to addressing the 'wicked' problems of the future.
These changes are required desperately anyway, and not just to facilitate the return of NRIs. Our challenge is to make our institutions welcome intellectual spaces, not just to those from outside who are seeking to return, but also to those who never left.