Mail Call

Mary Gonzalez Lundy

Sherwood, Oregon

A 'Quality Education' for All

Sudip Mazumdar's article "Grades and Politics" (Jan. 23) points out that "Some of the best brains in the world--in the fields of science, information technology, medicine and engineering"--are educated in India's private institutions and that India's public colleges "are a mess." Currently the public institutions reserve some percentage of seats for the poor and minorities, but the private schools, which charge five to 10 times more than the public colleges, do not. Some of the people Mazumdar interviewed were critical of the recent bill that mandates 22.5 percent reservation for poor and minorities in the private colleges, saying that it will bankrupt private educational institutions or it won't work. It is clear from the article that the poor and minorities go to public colleges because they offer a certain percentage of reserved seats and are cheaper, but the quality of education they receive is not on par with the rich who attend the private institutions. The government should intervene to remedy this situation. I suggest that the government subsidize 50 percent of the tuition fees for the 22.5 percent of the quota seats in private colleges. This will help the private institutions financially and help the poor and minorities get a quality education.

R. Muniappan

Yona, Guam