The flip side of education advertising in India

By Mahesh Peri

Hope may have a recession, but the business of selling hope never has one.

The bigger the hope, the bigger the business. A promoter once told me, “It is only in the business of education that we collect money upfront by selling a promise with no punishment for failing to fulfil those promises.”

If we look at failed education businesses, we realise how they took down millions of hopes and careers along with their own downfall.

Most questions and fervent pleas have a similar ring — legitimacy of the degree, trust and credibility of the claims, accuracy of information, etc. Some of the questions I have personally handled recently include: ‘Sir, this college is promising a degree without attending it regularly. Is it possible?’

‘Sir, the institute is claiming that students are dropping out from IITs and BITS to join them. Is it true?’

‘Sir, this institute promised 100% placement or full refund. Now they don’t even take my calls. Please help.’

‘I have done my BBA in 10/13 batch and am now planning to do my MBA but most of the top Indian institutions have rejected my application for MBA as my BBA is unapproved? What should I do, sir?’

Preying on gullibility?

The patterns are similar. The target group of all these ‘selling bright future’ institutions is the same — the frustrated and the gullible from tier-2/3 towns.

The promises are similar too — a bright career with 100% placement guarantees, with salaries running into lakhs of rupees.

The name dropping is also the same — ‘better than IIMs’; comparison against IITs, IIMs, NLUs etc.

The gullibility of the audience is such that they believe in earning a degree over 10 days or believe a tele caller working on a Rs 30,000 salary and get convinced that they will earn lakhs of rupees by doing a three-month course.

A recent ASCI survey suggested that nine out of 10 parents believe that advertisements andthe information in them are important factors that aid in their decision-making.

Education advertising also follows some disturbing patterns. Most ads show a bias in favour of promoting maths and science as sought-after subjects. There is also a preference of showcasing boys over girls. Some ads also stereotype a mother’s role.

Almost all ads rely on anecdotal or personal success stories to sell courses to millions of students without ever giving complete data and overall success rates. Imagine a mutual fund advertising about one particular investment which gave them the highest profits without disclosing overall returns?

Reining in false promises

In a competitive market, expecting all institutions to follow an ethical code of conduct is unrealistic. The consequences of such mis-selling are also far-reaching on the future of students. The powers of ASCI are post-mortem with no teeth for punitive measures. Only a regulatory intervention can make all institutions fall in line.

I am reminded of an SOS that a now failed company sent to the industry body, which read: “This would ensure no default on customers, so that it doesn’t cause the government to use this situation as a precedent to introduce regulation on ed-tech similar to what happened
in China.”

The industry is scared of government intervention — but, in my opinion, the latter seems to be the only way to tackle the issue, considering our failure in protecting gullible students and vulnerable parents.

That brings us to the big question. How do we rein in false and misleading advertising? How do we save millions of students from falling prey and ruining their careers? Do we leave it to the good conscience of the advertisers?
A career that is advertising for health and education should have a higher bar. Leaving it to the conscience hasn’t delivered good results. Advertisers will go the extra mile to comply with regulations. If it were the life and future of our own children, would we still leave this to the good conscience of an erring doctor/counsellor? It’s time to decide!

The author is the founder of Careers360. Views expressed are personal.