Reject the Draft University Grants Commission (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment and Promotion of Teachers and Academic Staff in Universities and Colleges and Measures for Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) Regulations, 2025.
Students’ Federation of India (SFI)
Central Executive Committee
Press Release
Date: 07/01/2025
Reject the Draft University Grants Commission (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment and Promotion of Teachers and Academic Staff in Universities and Colleges and Measures for Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) Regulations, 2025.
The draft University Grants Commission (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment and Promotion of Teachers and Academic Staff in Universities and Colleges and Measures for Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) Regulations, 2025, released on Monday (January 6, 2025) by Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan is another attempt to centralise and corporatise our campuses.
Already the governments in several Opposition-ruled States such as Tamil Nadu, Kerala were on a conflict with the Governors — also Chancellors of several State-run universities — over appointment of Vice-Chancellors. Now the revised rules provide state Governors with increased authority in the selection of Vice-Chancellors. It is quite evident that the process of shortlisting candidates for interview and final selection is very opaque: there’s no clarity about whoever will be called.
Also the new draft regulations for the first time allow industry experts and public sector veterans to be considered for the role. This marks a departure from the longstanding practice of exclusively appointing academicians and introduces corporate culture in academic areana. It will be massive dilution of the quality of faculty by doing away with specialisation in a core discipline and the recruitment gives 100% weightage to the selection committee which is subjective in nature and does not give any credit to academic qualification, research publications and teaching experience. It also shows a shift in focus from cutting edge research to merely reiterating existing knowledge: since core competence is done away with.
In this draft, there is no mention of the maximum hours to be put in for direct teaching in a week for teachers: a dangerous ploy to increase workload and to reduce jobs. It will affect the quality of teaching.
In the case of Promotion, there is too much emphasis given on activities which have no direct bearing on teaching and research in the Clause 3.8. Government is withdrawing its own responsibility from research and paves the way for the different private actors in the name of angel or venture funds. It will drive the whole education system towards market oriented research. There is no clarity about ‘angel or venture funds.’ It can lead towards saffronisation. Also there is a requirement of publications for direct recruitment to Associate Professor in the University departments has increased from 7 to 8, thus adding to the already heavy requirement in the existing Regulation. This draft keeps silent on reservation of teaching posts also.
In this situation, the Central Executive Committee of the Students’ Federation of India reject the new draconian draft and urge the academic community to come forward to save our higher education. We call upon the student community to protest against this by burning the draft notification.
Sd/-
VP Sanu (President)
Mayukh Biswas (General Secretary)