Mumbai University Ranked 9th in Producing Billionaires

University of Mumbai is one of the oldest universities in India. It was established in 1857.

A recent study on world's billionaires noted that University of Mumbai is the alma mater of 12 billionaires. Mumbai University has been ranked at the ninth spot in the list of top billionaire-producing institutes in the world, according to a study by Singapore-based wealth research consultancy Wealth-X and Swiss bank UBS.

This makes Mumbai University only the second institute from outside the US to find a place among the top 10 in terms of billionaire alma maters. London School of Economics (UK), ranked 10th, is the other institute outside the US to find a spot in this list. University of Pennsylvania, Harvard University and Yale University occupy the first three positions in this list, being alma maters of 25, 22 and 20 billionaires respectively. (See list below)

India's richest person Mukesh Ambani is an alumni of University of Mumbai. The chairman of Reliance Industries earned his chemical engineering degree from Institute of Chemical Technology, Mumbai (earlier University Department of Chemical Technology, University of Mumbai). He later pursued MBA from Stanford University, USA.

The report noted that pursuing higher education is not a prerequisite for attaining billionaire status: 35 per cent of the world's billionaires do not have a bachelor's degree and some even dropped out of high school.

Overall, India has retained its sixth position in terms of number of billionaires, with 100 such people collectively having $175 billion in networth. The report noted that the global billionaire population rose to 2,325 this year, a 7 per cent rise from 2013
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No new college to get affiliation next academic year, says Mumbai University

Even as the state government has been sitting on a report since 2011 recommending “sub-division” of Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur universities that are overburdened with affiliated colleges, Mumbai University has said in its perspective plan it will not grant affiliation to any new college in the 2015-16 academic year.

“Handling so many colleges is becoming difficult for the university. Hence, the perspective plan says there will be no new college in the next academic year,” said a senior university official.

Currently, there are over 700 colleges affiliated to MU. The plan document also talks about skill-based programmes in the existing colleges to make students employable. The plan, however, will need the approved of the academic council and the university senate.

The government had appointed three committees of higher education in 2010, of which one was mandated to look at the “sub-division” of universities. Calling for immediate division of big universities, the committee had recommended that Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur universities should immediately have a main campus/sub-centres or campuses in the suburbs and districts.

“A large number of students and affiliated colleges have created a huge workload of administrative, affiliation and evaluation functions, which has resulted in lowering the level of curricula, their relevance and modern nature, and on the whole reduced…quality and standards of students…The basis of sub-division is not on numbers but the need for quality and relevance of higher education, both for PG and UG courses,” the report said.

Academicians from MU said the National Knowledge Commission had also suggested having one university for every 150 affiliated colleges and that the state government needed to seriously consider such recommendations.

While the committees had submitted their reports in 2011, a fourth group reviewed the recommendations later and submitted a report suggesting a roadmap. The state government is, however, yet to take any action on the reports.

“A new government will be elected in the state after the Assembly elections, so no one really knows the fate of these reports,” said a Mumbai University faculty member.

mihika.basu@expressindia.com

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Mumbai University looks to avoid clash of TYBCom and CA exams

Mumbai University will frame the exam time-table for TYBCom students on odd days to avoid clashes with the chartered accountancy intermediate (IPC) exam. Since many university students appear for IPC and not CA final exam in November, officials have decided to start the exams post November 5, as decided earlier. Students will also get a shorter Diwali break this year, which will be compensated during the Christmas vacation. The proposal for the change in the academic term was accepted at the academic council meeting on Tuesday. A detailed time-table will be out in a day or two. The university received a letter from the Institute of Chartered Accountancy of India (ICAI) informing them about the dates of the IPC exam. Authorities added that most of the major exams such as TYBSc and TYBA that were rescheduled due to polls, will now begin from November 5 as decided in the board of examinations (BoE) meeting on Friday. TYBCom may start from November 6, said the controller, to avoid load on the first day. The other exams that were to be held in November before the poll dates were announced, such as the engineering exams, will remain as per the schedule, he said. Also the change in the academic term proposed by the BoE was also accepted by the council members. Colleges will now start their term from November 3 instead of November 10. The Christmas vacation will be for two weeks this year. “While the odd dates can be used for regular students from semester V, the even dates, when the IPC is scheduled, can be used for the repeaters’ exams,” said Madhu Nair, dean of commerce.

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