Economic development is approximately proportional to higher education and vice versa. Higher education and economic development is interlinked with each other. Knowledge is the very important element in making a country to be developed. Higher education plays an important role in developing rational thinking, analytical and visualizing power of human beings and creates research minds. It is the governing tool to make peoples aware towards their fundamental rights. It is also the blue print to establish the welfare state.  This paper deals with the issues, challenges, opportunities existing in Indian higher education system and also emphasize the suggestions and solutions to maintain the global standards of higher education system. Indian higher education system is suffering from several pertinent issues, challenges and inherent problems like access, equity, unemployment, poverty, excellence, efficiency, crisis of moral and spiritual values. Today’s students have been deviated from their relevant and real goal. They are participating in unsocial and unfair activities like ragging on campus, damaging laboratories and public properties, political based strikes and demonstrations which makes the student in unrest. Non relevant and traditional curriculum and syllabus is served in higher education. India is compel to face many major issues and challenges in higher education like Modern society is believing in Glamour. Very poor education approach to deprived peoples. Over privatization of higher education system. Very poor expenditure ratio in higher education to GDP. Poor scientific and technical temperament of higher education. Though there are many opportunities in higher education system as new generations are adopting new emerging learning tools, techniques, methods and approaches to overcome the challenges in Indian higher education system. Government is also forming new relevant policies, rules and regulations. Collaborations at international level is also better opportunity to maintain global standards. India is the richest country in the frame of resources of human as well as physical. Job oriented, practically biased and more realistic curriculum could be formed to enhance the production of qualified students.

Keywords: Interlinked, Spiritual, Deprived, Temperament, Collaborations.