Based on the University Grants Commission’s recommendations, the Ministry of Education has handed over twelve letters of intent to top foreign universities to establish their campuses in India during the last year. One U.K. university campus has already opened its doors in Gurugram, launching its academic programmes for the 2025-26 academic session, with the remaining universities setting up their campuses in Bengaluru, Chennai, Mumbai and the National Capital Region. The fact that world-class universities are establishing their physical campuses in India shows our conscious policy realignment. It opens new opportunities for Indian students and expands our educational horizons in ways we could hardly imagine a decade ago.
The beginning point for this development is a regulation introduced by the University Grants Commission (UGC) in 2023. The idea is to allow top-ranking foreign universities to establish campuses in India with operational autonomy and regulatory clarity. The UGC took this calibrated decision to align with the vision of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. At its core, NEP 2020 calls for re-imagining higher education to be globally competitive while remaining locally rooted. Facilitating the establishment of global university campuses in India constitutes a direct implementation of that objective. It illustrates India’s growing ambition to reconfigure its higher education footprint by hosting world-class institutions.
Why now?
Because India stands at an inflexion point. With a large aspirational youth population, India has a rapidly expanding and stable economy. Our startup economy ranks among the fastest-growing globally and is a crucible of global innovation. There is a surge in demand for quality higher education, especially in new-age fields such as AI, design, data science, sustainability, and finance.
Foreign universities are not arriving on empty ground. They are coming into a country already undergoing serious educational reform. Multidisciplinarity is being actively built into the curriculum. We are adopting hybrid educational delivery mechanisms using digital public infrastructure. Research funding is being streamlined through the Anusandhan National Research Foundation. Quality assurance mechanisms are becoming more outcome-oriented due to the ongoing reforms in accreditation. Foreign universities see the potential. Many Western institutions face diverse challenges, including rising operational costs, demographic changes, and expanding internationally. Establishing campuses in countries with a high youth population and growing intellectual capital makes strategic sense. India offers both. Indeed, India’s educational and economic progress is being noticed globally.
Local advantage, global gains
For students in India, its long-term impact could be truly consequential. Access to international-quality education without the high costs of going abroad changes the game entirely. Families no longer have to stretch their finances or send their children halfway across the world to access global curricula, faculty, and research opportunities. The benefits go beyond academic degrees. Students will have exposure to diverse peer networks, industry partnerships, and entrepreneurial ecosystems embedded within their own country.
And here lies a critical point. Students who might not have considered international education due to economic or social constraints can make that possibility real now. With such campuses here, the pathway to global education becomes more attainable without compromising familial comfort or cultural proximity. From the parents’ perspective, the appeal is straightforward. They want their children to have the best possible education, and they want to feel secure in that choice. Sending a child abroad involves logistical, emotional, and financial complications. With global campuses coming to Indian cities, that equation changes. It becomes easier to reconcile aspiration with assurance.
This situation, in turn, raises the bar for Indian institutions as well. Healthy competition never hurts a system. When foreign university campuses in India offer cutting-edge programmes, our universities must innovate, reflect, and re-energise their models. There is a strong case for research collaboration, too. For instance, we have already seen IITs, IISERs, AIIMS, central universities, and state universities increasingly collaborate with global partners, focusing on areas such as renewable energy, public health, and engineering. Australian and UK universities share strong educational collaborations with Indian universities. European and the USA universities are intensifying linkages. These collaborations support research, innovation, and skills development, strengthening the academic ties between nations. The new campuses established by the foreign universities will only accelerate that process.
Education powerhouse
Undoubtedly, India is a rising power in technology, diplomacy, and manufacturing. Yet, we rarely speak of our potential in global education with the same conviction. It is time to change that. India must position itself as an emerging force in international education not by imitating the Western university model, but by drawing the world to engage with us on our terms, within our cultural, intellectual, and societal landscape. India’s centuries-old tradition of scholarship, from Nalanda to Shantiniketan, should not be seen as relics of the past, but as living sources of credibility in shaping a distinctive, modern learning environment. India already draws thousands of international students each year, yet the scale is negligible compared to our potential. Our linguistic diversity, democratic environment, and rapidly modernising infrastructure offer a compelling case for becoming a global education hub. Some claim that prioritising global education is a distraction from India’s domestic needs. The truth is the opposite. Inviting the world’s students, researchers, and institutions to work with us here also lifts our universities’ quality, resources, and ambitions. To ignore this is to allow other nations to monopolise the narrative of what “world-class education” means, while we remain consumers instead of shapers of that narrative.
What began as an idea central to NEP 2020 is now unfolding as a powerful new chapter in India’s knowledge economy. By facilitating the establishment of international branch campuses, India is actively reimagining the contours of learning within a globally integrated educational ecosystem. The choice for students between staying in India and going abroad is no longer a dilemma. It is a possibility waiting at their doorstep. And that is a future worth building.
Mamidala Jagadesh Kumar is former Chairman, UGC and a former V-C, JNU (Views are personal).
Published – September 15, 2025 01:05 am IST