Indian educational degrees to be recognised in Australia: Why this is significant

Some Indian educational degrees are now set to be recognised in Australia. Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese on announced that the Australia-India Education Qualification Recognition Mechanism had been finalised on Wednesday evening. Albanese, who is on his first trip to India, made the announcement at a program in Ahmedbad where it was officially announced that Australia’s Deakin University would set up an international branch campus at GIFT City in Gujarat’s Gandhinagar. “There is a significant development in our bilateral education relation. I am pleased to tell you that we have finalised Australia-India Education Qualification Recognition Mechanism,” Albanese said. Let’s take a closer look at why this is significant: What is the Australia-India Education Qualification Recognition Mechanism? According to Indian Express, under this scheme degrees attained in India will be recognised in Australia and vice-versa. However, professional qualifications such as engineering, medicine and law are not included under this agreement. Alabenese called it the “most comprehensive and ambitious arrangement” agreed to by India with any country, which “paves the way for commercial opportunities for Australian education providers to offer innovative and more accessible education to Indian students.” It also provides a solid basis for educational institutions to consider new ways to partner with each other, the Australian prime minister said.

“It is a fantastic piece of work that will have really tangible benefits,” the visiting prime minister added.

“The new mechanism means that if you are an Indian student who is studying or have studied in Australia, your hard-earned degree will be recognised when you return home. Or if you are a member of Australia’s very large Indian diaspora –500,000 and growing — you will feel more confident that your Indian qualification will be recognised in Australia,” Albanese said. According to Indian Express, the mechanism was agreed to during Australian education minister Jason Clare’s visit to Delhi last week. Clare, who met Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan, told the newspaper, “India has other agreements with countries like the US. What makes this broader than the agreement with the US is it includes online courses also, apart from courses that Australian universities can run in India or at a standalone campus like the one that University of Wollongong is setting up.” Maitri scholarship launched Albanese also announced a new scholarship –Maitri (friendship) scholarship — for Indian students to study in Australia for up to four years. “The scholarships are part of the wider Maitri programme that seeks to boost cultural, educational and community ties between Australia and India,” he said. The Australian government in a statement in February said that it had launched three Maitri scholarships to foster Australia-India cooperation, creativity, understanding and exchange. This after a meeting between Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister for Women Senator Marise Payne and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. “The $11.2 million Maitri Scholarships Program will attract and support high achieving Indian students to study at Australian universities. It will showcase Australia’s globally renowned academic and research institutions, particularly in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and health,” the statement read. ‘Great honour’ Albanese said that it was a great honour for Deakin University to set up its international campus in India. It was also a great honour for Australia that a university from the country would be the first to set up an international campus in India, he said. The University of Wollongong also intends to set up a campus at GIFT City, he said, adding that Australia will always welcome foreign students and it was a great thing that they are back in large numbers this year. “But not everyone has the means or abilities to pack up their lives and study in another country. There might be financial constraints or family commitment, so a variety of reasons that you want to or need to stay close to home,” Albanese said. He hoped that the campus in GIFT City will see not just students from India but also from Australia, the visiting prime minister said. Speaking on the occasion, Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel said the state has made it its mission to become a national and international education hub under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s guidance. He also talked about the sister-city agreement that Gujarat entered into with New South Wales of Australia in 2018, and said that Gujarat and Australia have enjoyed people-to-people connect for a long time. “Free trade agreement has become a new medium to give a new height to the bilateral relations between India and Australia. Gujarat is a growth engine of development, and I am sure it will get special benefit of bilateral relationship with India and Australia,” Patel said. Vice Chancellor of Deakin University Iain Martin said he hoped that the international campus at GIFT City would become operational from 2024.

To start with, it will offer two courses in cyber security and business analytics with 60 students in each course, he said.

On Thursday, the University of Melbourne in Australia announced collaborations with three educational institutions – the University of Madras, Savitribai Phule University in Pune, and the Gandhi Institute of Technology & Management in Hyderabad. The partnership offers a new undergraduate dual degree in science to the students of these universities. Under this, Indian students who enrol in the new dual degree will be able to complete it in India and abroad, spending the first two years studying in the country, followed by two years on campus in Melbourne, the Australian institute said here. In addition, the students can study up to six master’s subjects in their final year so they can fast-track a master’s degree from a suite of disciplines, including science, engineering, public health and data science, University of Melbourne vice-chancellor Duncan Maskell said_._ With inputs from agencies Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News , India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.