NEW DELHI: Amidst political slugfest over the UGC draft regulations on the appointment of faculty and academic staff in universities and colleges, the University Grants Commission (UGC) on Thursday announced the extension till February 28 for receiving public feedback on the controversial draft regulation.
A day after six non-BJP ruled states sought immediate withdrawal of the draft recruitment and promotion norms, INDIA-bloc parties escalated the issue, as the DMK organised a protest in the national capital.
Addressing the DMK student wing protest, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi alleged that an attempt is being made to push the RSS agenda to achieve its idea of imposing “one history, one tradition, one language” on the country.
Reacting to Congress leader’s allegation, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said, “It is both unfortunate and concerning to see how some political leaders, including the LoP, twist progressive educational reforms into imaginary threats to sustain their outdated political narratives.”
In a public notice, the UGC Secretary, Prof. Manish R Joshi, said, “Given requests from stakeholders to extend the last date to submit feedback on the draft UGC Regulations 2025, UGC has now decided to extend the last date to February 28, 2025.”
“Stakeholders can submit feedback on the draft regulations till 28/02/2025 at the following email address: draft-regulations@ugc.gov.in.”
The draft was uploaded on the UGC website on January 6, 2025. The UGC requested feedback from stakeholders till February 5, 2025.
Taking on the centre, Gandhi said, “Each state has its traditions, history, and language, and that is why I keep saying that, in the Constitution, India is called a 'Union of States'. That means all these histories, traditions, and languages come together to make India the Union of States, and so that is how we have to think about it.”
“We have to respect all the languages, all the cultures, all the traditions, all the histories, and we have to understand where they come from," said the Congress leader.
At the meeting, Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav said, “The Samajwadi Party fully supports this protest against the New Education Policy being introduced by the central government. This New Education Policy is a conspiracy to hand over universities to industrialists. It aims to strip state governments of their powers and turn politicians into servants of industrialists. We will never support this policy. They want to seize all the powers of the state governments.”
However, Pradhan, in a post in X, said, “The UGC draft regulations aim to broaden horizons, not narrow them. They seek to include more voices, not silence them. They uphold institutional autonomy and our linguistic diversity. They strengthen our academic institutions, not weaken them. But perhaps these facts are too inconvenient for those who prefer rhetoric over reality."
He said opposing something just for the sake of opposing it may be fashionable; it may be good political posturing, but it is undoubtedly petty politics.
"I humbly suggest that Shri @RahulGandhi and the self-proclaimed champions of Constitution invest some time in reading the draft regulations before launching their rehearsed political performances," he added.
On Thursday, six ministers or their representatives from Karnataka, Telangana, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Himachal Pradesh and Jharkhand (all opposition-ruled states) adopted a 15-point resolution on the UGC's draft regulations.
According to the draft regulations, industry experts and senior professionals from public administration, public policy, and public sector undertakings might soon be eligible for appointment as vice-chancellors. The draft norms have also given power to chancellors or visitors to constitute the three-member search-cum-selection committee to appoint vice-chancellors.
The new guidelines will also amend the norms for hiring faculty members in universities, allowing people with postgraduate degrees in Master of Engineering (M.E) and Masters of Technology (MTech), with at least 55 per cent marks, to be directly recruited to the Assistant Professor level without qualifying for the UGC National Eligibility Test (NET).