The draft University Grants Commission (UGC) Guidelines 2025 is a blatant attempt by the Union Government to suppress whatever little academic freedom scholars in Indian Universities, both central and state, enjoy.

Education is a subject in the Concurrent List, and both the Union and State governments are empowered to make laws governing educational institutions. India has 1074 Universities, 56 of which are central universities, and the remaining 1018 include universities set up by the states and private universities.

In principle, the University Grants Commission is an independent body. However, from its inception in 1953, like the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), the administration of UGC has been done at the whims and fancies of the bureaucracy, which has been changing colour at the bidding of the party in power.

The UGC was primarily set up to provide or grant finances to higher education institutions in the country. Over the years, the Union government has been cutting down on funding, and the UGC, in order to justify its existence, has been encroaching on the rights of Universities, both central and state, to function autonomously.

While it has become a fashion to sermonise on autonomy, the UGC has been in the name of educational reforms tightening the grip over universities by issuing more bureaucratic rules and regulations regarding appointments, maintenance of academic standards and even selection of subjects for study and research.

India is a diverse country with many cultures, languages, and traditions. Therefore, a uniform pattern of education that could be enforced throughout the country is impossible. The UGC guidelines 2025 are a mindless attempt to emulate the ruling party's slogan of one country, one election in the field of education. Now we also need "One Education !"

The most dangerous guideline in the UGC document regards the appointment of vice-chancellors of the Universities, both central and state. In the appointment of vice-chancellors, the governors of the states, many of whom are already in constant conflict with elected State governments, have been given absolute power. The governors we have seen throughout independent India's history, have been acting as the arm of the union government, reducing elected state governments to mere observers.

Section 10.1 relates to the appointment of vice-chancellors in Universities. The 2018 regulation stipulated that the vice-chancellor should have an academic background, but the 2025 guidelines allow people from the bureaucracy, industry, etc., to become vice-chancellors. This would result in the handing over of public-funded higher education Institutions to corporates who will not work towards the public good.

Moreover, clause 10.1 (iii), (iv) and (v) on the constitution of a search -cum- Selection Committee for appoint of vice-chancellors is very arbitrary and undemocratic. The governors in the states who are union appointees and chancellors of the universities will now have absolute control over the selection process and also will have the final say on the appointment of vice-chancellors.

The 2018 regulation said the vice-chancellor should be a "distinguished academician" with a minimum of ten years of experience as a professor in a university or ten years of experience "in a reputed research and/or academic administrative organisation with proof of having demonstrated academic leadership."

The new draft policy says the vice-chancellor candidate should be a "distinguished person possessing high academic qualifications and demonstrated administrative and leadership capabilities," with a minimum of ten years of experience as a professor in a higher education institution or at a senior level in a reputed research or academic, administrative organisation, or at a senior level in industry, public administration, public policy and or public sector undertaking, with a "proven track record of significant academic or scholarly contributions."

The sinister intentions behind the Draft UGC (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment and Promotion of Teachers and Academics Staff in Universities and Colleges and Measures for the Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) Regulations, 2025 is crystal clear from the fact that it was released by the Union Ministry of Education.

The Union Ministry of Education's assuming unbridled power over even the UGC is contrary to the vision contained in the National Education Policy 2020, which aims to achieve full academic and administrative autonomy for all higher educational institutions in the country.

To sum up, the UGC 2025 guidelines are a threat to federalism and, if implemented, will lead to imposing the will of the Union government in all the central and state and higher educational institutions in the country. The Tamil Nadu legislature has already passed a resolution demanding the withdrawal of Draft UGC regulations. Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on January 14 accused the Union Government and UGC of "attempting to destabilise" higher educational institutions in the country. Vijayan rightly pointed out that the regulations "threaten the autonomy" of the state universities and undermine the independence granted to them by acts formulated by elected legislative assemblies.