The IITs – Indian Institutes of Technology, the premier engineering schools in India – present an interesting case study that provides a window into the fascinating economy of India. There are now 15 IIT campuses across the country, which have an annual intake of about 7,500 students, mostly for four-year engineering degrees. There is a “joint entrance exam”,  or JEE, to get admission into an IIT and an estimated 400,000 students appear for it. That means about two out of every 100 who apply get into an IIT. To a first approximation, as economists put it, nobody gets into IITs. 

Getting into an IIT is serious business. The insane level of competition to get into an IIT infects not just the students but also their families. Preparations start years before, often when the student is in the 8th grade – a full four years of slogging. Hundreds of thousands enroll into coaching classes that prepare the student for taking the JEE. The coaching business is itself massive. The money spent is phenomenal. All told, people spend more on JEE coaching classes per year than the entire budget of all the IITs combined. Some instructors in the more successful coaching services earn 50 to 100 times more than the faculty of IITs. 

There is a mad rush to get into the better JEE coaching classes. Let’s call them A-level coaching institutes. A-level institutes have to conduct their own entrance exams not only because their capacity is limited but also to select the best among the students. So there are coaching institutes – let’s call them B-level – whose business is to coach students to pass the A-level institutes’ entrance exams. I suppose with time there will be C-level coaching classes that prepare the students for passing the entrance exams to the B-level coaching services that prepare students for the A-level coaching institutes that prepare the students for appearing in the JEE so that they can enroll in an IIT.

I have had parents write to me asking for advice on which classes their 10-year old son or daughter should enroll so that they get into an IIT about seven years later. 

Institutionalized insanity is a weak phrase when applied to the Indian education system. It is surely a marvel to behold. It makes you wonder how it has come to such a pass and why. Let’s do that in a bit.