India has officially jumped on to the open online courses bandwagon with the government announcing Swayam, an initiative that aims at providing affordable and quality education to citizens for free. The move is a welcome step in India, which battles a shortage of infrastructure and qualified teachers in higher education, with the model also having the potential to democratise higher education, experts say. MOOCs or massive open online courses is a system aimed at unlimited participation and open access via the web. It does not always quantify as formal education but provides a platform to study quality courses from institutions offering them, usually for free.

Read the Economic Times news report here.