MIC-MARA University in India

It was announced on Monday that the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC) headed by its president Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu, in collaboration with Majlis Amanah Rakyat (MARA) will be looking to set up a university in India.

Datuk Seri Samy Vellu announced this during his visit to Hyderabad, after receiving the idea from Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who suggested that overseas Indians could set up universities in the sub-continent.

Datuk Seri Samy Vellu argued that it is "cost effective to construct the university in India where teaching expertise and materials were easily available". In addition, the new university will cater to Malaysians to seeking to pursue studies overseas, particularly in medicine, as the existing institution set up by MIC, the Asian Institute of Medical, Science and Technology (AIMST) in Kedah is unable to cope with growing demand.

But this is where I cannot fully comprehend the logic or economics of the proposed exercise. How is it more cost-effective to build a university from scratch in Hyderabad instead spending the money in improving the facilities of existing universities in Malaysia? How is it that we must actually build a physical university in Hyderabad to employ the "teaching expertise and materials" available in India, instead of just paying a premium for their services to teach in Malaysia, which I'm certain will still be infinitely cheaper?

Could it then be a commercial exercise? I have no problems if commercial private educational institutions, such as Sunway and Inti, decide to set up operations and branch campuses overseas for it is their prime objective to maximise profits in a world without borders. However, for organisations such as MIC and MARA whose objectives is socio-political, why should they be involved in a commercial project out of the country with little trickle down benefit for Malaysians?

For all you know, the only parties who will benefit commercially from the project will be the party who will be selling or renting the piece of land to MIC, and the contractors who will be given the task of building the new university. If the venture doesn't become commercially viable, the it will be MIC's and MARA's folly, and ultimately putting to waste the monetary contributions from Malaysian citizens and government in a country that is not even ours.

Let's hope that the team at MARA is a little more enlightened than the MIC counterparts and dismiss the idea as non-beneficial to Malaysians (in general).