UGC caste discrimination guidelines being reconsidered: Centre tells Supreme Court

The Union government told the Supreme Court on Thursday that it is reconsidering the controversial University Grants Commission guidelines drawn up to address caste discrimination on campuses.

Appearing for the Centre and the UGC, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta told a bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant that the government was examining the regulations and had not yet decided on the course it would take.

“I’m not saying which way it will go, but we are reconsidering it,” Mehta told the court.

The bench was hearing a group of petitions that challenge the UGC guidelines, primarily arguing that they refer to caste-based discrimination only against members of Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and OBC communities while excluding those from the general category.

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The challenge also contends that the regulations are inconsistent with the University Grants Commission Act, 1956, and could undermine the objective of ensuring equal opportunity in higher education.

The petitioners have also raised concerns about the scope of the regulations and the possibility of their provisions being misused.

On January 29, a bench led by the Chief Justice of India had stayed the University Grants Commission (Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions) Regulations 2026, which were notified on January 13, saying they raise important questions that, if left unexamined, could have “very sweeping consequences” and “divide society”.

The bench had issued notices to the Centre and the UGC and directed that the “2012 Regulations will continue in force till further orders”.

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The bench had said that “upon a prima facie consideration, it appears to us that some of the provisions of the Impugned Regulations suffer from certain ambiguities, and the possibility of their misuse cannot be ruled out”.

The bench had also observed orally that the government must constitute a committee of eminent jurists to look into the issue.

Justice Joymalya Bagchi, who was also on the bench, said, “We should not go to a stage where we go to segregated schools as in the United States, where coloured children go to one school, and white boys and girls go to another school. The unity of India must be reflected in the educational institutions.”

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The court said there might be instances of economically well-off students from a caste harassing others within the same caste, and sought to know how the regulations address such a scenario.

“This kind of situation can be exploited by the mischievous elements in the society,” the CJI had said.

The petitioners, Mritunjay Tiwari, advocate Vineet Jindal, and Rahul Dewan, have primarily challenged section 3(1)(c) of the regulations.

The UGC regulations arise from a 2019 petition filed in the Supreme Court by the mothers of Payal Tadvi and Rohith Vemula, who died by suicide over alleged caste-based discrimination in 2019 and 2016, respectively. They had sought the enforcement of robust anti-discrimination mechanisms across higher education institutions.

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The court, meanwhile, granted the UGC four weeks to respond to the petitions challenging the regulations and directed it to file a comprehensive counter-affidavit addressing the issues raised by all the petitioners. It directed that copies of the UGC’s affidavit be furnished to all the petitioners, who will then have two weeks to file their rejoinders.

The matter will now be taken up after four weeks.