PDF: 2962 pages, 5.2 MB - Bay Area Council Economic Institute

Global Reach
in California on tuition and fees plus living expenses, the Indian students’ proportionate share
amounts to some $240 million, up from $232 million in 2006–07 and $155 million in 2005–06.
Statistics are collected and reported differently by different university systems and individual
campuses, making precise numbers elusive. A survey of the UC and California State University
systems, Stanford University, University of San Francisco and Santa Clara University suggests
that more than 3,500 visiting undergraduate and graduate Indian students are enrolled at major
Bay Area institutions.
Most visiting scholars enter the U.S. on J-1 exchange visitor visas. The U.S. Department of
Homeland Security (DHS) reported just under 6,000 Indian nationals entering the U.S. on those
visas in 2006. DHS does not provide a breakdown of these arrivals by destination state or institution,
but the survey of Bay Area campuses indicates a number in the 300–400 range.
UC Berkeley, as discussed earlier, has a history of Indian students dating back to the
turn of the 20th century. For that reason, says Ananya Roy, an associate professor of
city and regional planning who is also associate dean of academic affairs in the division
of international and area studies and co-chair of the Berkeley India Initiative, Berkeley’s traditional
strength Indian studies has been in the humanities. The university last year celebrated its
100th year of teaching Sanskrit, for example, and has dedicated itself to preserving key regional
Indian languages that are giving way to English instruction in many Indian schools.
Berkeley has 45 faculty that specialize in India, in fields ranging from engineering to comparative
literature, and it boasts 88 visiting scholars from India, most of them in medicine, plant sciences,
chemistry, physics and mathematics. It has 127 students from India with F-1 student visas, and
many more who are first-generation children of immigrants.
The university’s Center for South Asia Studies (CSAS) serves as a focal point for India-related
research and programs across multiple departments. Housed within CSAS, the Berkeley India
Initiative (BII), launched in 2007, has been specifically set up to coordinate multi-disciplinary
research and exchanges taking place with respect to India, including:
• research on key sectors of the Indian economy and global links, particularly in high-technology;
• identification of key policy interventions for expanding economic opportunity and
mitigating poverty and inequality; and
• examination of issues of governance in the world’s largest democracy.
BII is also looking to fund through CSAS an annual Berkeley-India Forum, an India Chair in
Sustainable Development, graduate student fellowships, and undergraduate study abroad programs.
On the cultural front, BII wants to continue to expand Berkeley’s work in documenting and preserving
Indian languages and culture with intensive language instruction and student exchanges.
In May 2007, Berkeley hosted the first in a series of conferences as part of the Project on Indian
Democracy, a partnership with the U.S.-based nonprofit Foundation for Democratic reforms in
India. The conference on governance and citizen empowerment featured, among others, Union
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