Supreme Court units eight-week deadline for UGC to include solutions to deal with caste-based bias

The Supreme Court on Monday (September 15, 2025) directed the University Grants Commission (UGC) to think about the solutions acquired from stakeholders on tackling caste-based discrimination in larger training campuses and to include them into the University Grants Commission (Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions) Regulations, 2025, inside eight weeks.

A Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi was listening to a petition filed six years in the past by the moms of Rohith Vemula and Payal Tadvi, represented by senior advocate Indira Jaising and advocates Prasanna S. and Disha Wadekar. The petition sought pressing measures towards what the petitioners described as “rampant” caste discrimination in universities, which they mentioned had claimed their youngsters’s lives.

Rohith Vemula, a PhD scholar at Hyderabad Central University, and Payal Tadvi, a tribal pupil of T.N. Topiwala National Medical College, died by suicide in January 2016 and May 2019, respectively, after going through caste-based bias on campus.

Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta, showing for the Union authorities, knowledgeable the courtroom that almost 391 solutions had been acquired on the 2025 Regulations. He added {that a} UGC-appointed knowledgeable committee chaired by Shailesh N. Zala, former Vice-Chancellor of Maharaja Krishnakumar Sinhji Bhavnagar University in Gujarat, was analyzing the solutions and had forwarded them to the UGC for consideration.

“The committee is analyzing these solutions, and the rules will probably be amended accordingly if the UGC accepts them. It is at this stage,” he mentioned.

Ms. Jaising, showing for the petitioners, informed the courtroom that there had been an inordinate delay in addressing the treatments sought and that a number of college students had died by suicide within the meantime. “The focus of this petition is particularly on caste-based discrimination. Earlier judgments of the Supreme Court coping with campus discrimination have been impartial in relation to caste. My curiosity is prevention relatively than treatment,” she mentioned.

Key suggestions

Justice Kant famous that Ms. Jaising’s written be aware submitted to the courtroom had summarised ten core points that wanted to be addressed, together with a transparent ban on discriminatory practices, psychological well being counselling, and social audits. “Our proposal is that now that the matter is pending with the UGC and the knowledgeable committee, a remaining choice with regard to the rules will probably be taken by them. We direct at present that these factors can even be thought of for incorporation within the rules,” he mentioned.

When Ms. Jaising identified {that a} timeline needs to be mounted on this “everlasting train” in order that extra college students don’t face caste discrimination within the interregnum interval, the Bench assured her that an eight-week deadline could be imposed.

“We will repair a timeline and hold the matter open. If a few of the solutions will not be included, we’ll study the explanations,” Justice Kant mentioned, including that sure proposals might be “problematic” in the long term.

The Bench accordingly directed the UGC to look at a spread of suggestions, together with a ban on all types of discriminatory practices with disciplinary penalties, a prohibition on segregation in hostels and lecture rooms, and a digitised scholarship system to forestall harassment by way of delayed disbursal of funds. It additionally requested the UGC to think about establishing grievance committees with not less than half their members from the Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, and Other Backward Class communities, with their orders appealable earlier than the National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) and the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST).

Other proposals positioned earlier than the courtroom included safety mechanisms for complainants modelled on witness safety, private legal responsibility of employees for negligence, specialised counselling for college kids from marginalised backgrounds, social audits, National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) reporting on anti-discrimination measures, and withdrawal of grants from non-compliant establishments.