Australian deputy prime minister Julia Gillard promised on Monday to save Indian students studying Down Under from violence and fraudulent institutions.
Gillard is on a five-day damage repair tour to India following attacks on students in Sydney and Melbourne. “I am here to reinforce Australia’s image of a culturally-diverse, welcoming and safe country. I want to offer reassurance to the students here that Australia is taking necessary measures for their safety. Australia has zero tolerance for violence against Indian students and others,” she said.
About 1,00,000 Indian students study in various Australian institutes. Gillard listed out the various legislations and reforms her country has decided to initiate to regulate education-providers and international students’ safety. She said 120 additional police officers had been posted in sensitive areas, such as Victoria and Canberra, to make Indian students feel secure.
“Police patrols have been increased substantially for visible policing on streets. Already a large number of arrests have been made,” Gillard said. Australia has also taken up community-sensitisation programmes to reduce tension between Indians and locals.
Gillard said even in this time of economic slowdown, there were a large number of part-time jobs available for Indian students in Australia. She also listed out other student-welfare activities for Indians such as better-fare compensation and accommodation.
About complaints that some Australian private colleges were offering sub-standard education and jeopardising the careers of students, Gillard said her government was conducting a quality audit of all educational institutions to weed out fraudulent, substandard and dubious ones. Australia is planning to bring a legislation to make periodic re-registration mandatory for all institutions offering vocational courses.
“Anyone failing to do so will be out of business,” she said and assured that students enrolled in such colleges would get a comparable seat in other institutions or their fees would be refunded.
