US-India task force shows research relationship ‘heating up’

A group of leading American research institutions has launched a task force to expand US-India university partnerships, a step that scholars say demonstrates US higher education’s growing focus on the country.

Created by the Association of American Universities (AAU) in coordination with the Biden administration’s US-India Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology, the task force will meet monthly to “determine key focus areas for bilateral research and education cooperation”, according to an announcement earlier this month.

Its participants include top administrators from prestigious private institutions including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as well as large public universities.

Neeli Bendapuri, president of Pennsylvania State University and one of the group’s co-chairs, said the task force’s creation represented a “significant” step for the US and India.

“We are not aware of a previous similar task force focused on building partnerships among the universities of both nations, but this new effort is based on decades of collaboration and cooperation between the two countries,” she told Times Higher Education.

It was, she continued, difficult to predict whether US institutions will follow Australian universities – two of which have recently announced plans for branch campuses in India – although it is “imperative that US universities consider all possibilities for strengthening the relationship between our nations”.

Heidi Arola, a task force member and director of global partnerships and the Purdue-India Partnership at Purdue University, said the creation of the AAU group “demonstrates that US universities, overall, are increasingly looking to India” to form ties. But she stressed that for her institution, as for many, collaboration with India was nothing new.

“Our Purdue-India Partnership is about a decade old; we have considered India to be a top strategic partner nation and have invested in forging deep and sustainable relationships with Indian…institutions,” she said.

Nevertheless, higher education scholars said the recently created task force indicated growing and widespread interest in the country by US institutions.

“India’s become hot,” said Philip Altbach, professor of higher education at Boston College, who is not involved in the initiative.

He noted that US-China tensions – which will likely become a “permanent part of the landscape” – are undoubtedly a big contributing factor in the heightened focus on India. But he also pointed to New Delhi’s emphasis on revamping higher education via its 2020 National Education Policy (NEP).

“India itself is opening up,” Professor Altbach said. “The NEP is an indication that India is focusing more on the quality and scope of its research enterprise.”

While many US institutions had long had collaborations in India, he said, he was unaware of previous large-scale efforts to think strategically about academic ties with the country – something he attributed to the US’ lack of a national higher education policy.

“The US is waking up finally,” he added.

Simon Marginson, professor of higher education at the University of Oxford, agreed. “There’s every reason to think it is a ripe time for strengthening India-US links,” he said.

Still, he stopped short of predicting that India could come to replace China as the US’ largest research collaborator.

“The US’ only substitute for its research relationship with China – which had become a relationship of equals by the late 2010s – would be to restore and re-strengthen that relationship. Which is not going to happen,” he said.

While the US could look to India to replace some of these partnerships, this option has “much lesser potential” than the US-China relationship because Indian science is “not comparable to China’s size in quantity, field specialisations and quality”, Professor Marginson said.

pola.lem@timeshighereducation.com