UGC-British Council Signed MoU Under Second Phase of UK India Education and Research Initiative

Ved Prakash, Chairman of University Grants Commission (UGC) and Rob Lynes, Director of British Council (on behalf of UK UKIERI partners) formally signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on, 16 August 2011 to support all activities and programmes agreed under Phase Two of the UKIERI programme relating to the University sector across the four strands.

The MoU was signed in the presence of Kapil Sibal, Union Minister for Human Resource Development and Sir Richard Stagg, British High Commissioner to India. This MoU aims to work with UGC for implementation of strand programmes and activities in the Higher Education Institutions in India. This MoU is in continuation to the MoU signed between Ministry of Human Resource Development of the Government of India and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills on behalf of the Government and the Devolved Administrations of the UK including Northern Ireland, which sets out the framework for UKIERI from 2011-2016.

The UGC British Council MoU will be the guiding document for overall collaboration and the following type of activities will be supported–

• Collaboration between Higher Education Institutions in India and the UK to work with key partners and stakeholders in both countries with the aim of providing opportunities to teachers, faculty members, senior staff and students from universities, colleges and other educational institutions to build capacity.

• Programmes that aim to provide opportunities for the UK and Indian universities to collaborate on thematic partnerships on mutually agreed areas.

• Activities and strand programmes that aim to foster mobility of students across the two countries.

• Activities and programmes that work towards the transferability and equivalence of qualifications through recognition of learning and achievements between the two countries.

• Activities and strand programmes for jointly supported scholarships and fellowships.