UGC Protest Intensifies As Students Give 15-Day Ultimatum And Supreme Court Prepares To Hear Pleas

Mumbai: As the protest outside the University Grants Commission (UGC) in New Delhi intensified, the students offered a 15-day ultimatum to comply with their demands, meanwhile the supreme court is expected to hear the plea filed.

New Rules

For the past three days, the students have been protesting outside the UGC against the new notification of ‘Promotion of equity in higher educational institutes’ released earlier this month.

The notification was released with the aim of tackling discrimination based on caste, religion, gender and disability on the campus. It mandated all the higher educational institutes to set up equal opportunity centres, with representatives of Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), and Other Backward Classes (OBCs), women, and people with disability. Thus, making colleges and universities directly responsible for the discrimination on the campus.

The notification further mandated the HEI to have special equity committees, monitoring teams and helplines with various representatives. It also gives time bound targets to accept complaints, review and report the action.

Student Demand

This triggered the students for lack of representation from the open category. The students have demanded for revised rules with provisions to safeguard the accused and punishment for false and malicious complaints. They also demanded for the accuser’s identity to remain anonymous. However, the union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan assured that there will be no misuse of the power.

The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, an affiliated student organisation of the RSS has also urged the government for a revised draft, while the National Students Union of India has come in support of the regulations.

Two writ petitions have been filed in the SC. The first writ petition has been filed by Mrityunjay Tiwari, a post-doctoral researcher at Banaras Hindu University, Uttar Pradesh, assailing the University Grants Commission (Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions) Regulations, 2026. A second petition was filed in the Supreme Court on Tuesday by advocate Vineet Jindal, challenging the constitutional validity of the 2026 regulations.