The University Grants Commission of India - UGC, notified the Redressal of Grievances of Students Regulations, 2023, in the Official Gazette on 11 April 2023.
Under these Regulations, all universities existing in India (1163 as on today's date) were asked to appoint Ombudsperson(s) for the redressal of grievances of students, within 30 days of the notification, i.e., latest by 10 May 2023. Letters addressed to all heads of universities were sent by UGC to this effect on 12 April 2023. Further, as per UGC, this was followed with several reminders.
In view of preceding, UGC in its notice dated 5 December 2023, noted that some universities were yet to comply with the Regulations and "the matter is being viewed seriously". UGC also said that in case of a continuous non-compliance, "it may be constrained to take punitive action(s) against such Universities as per the provisions of the Regulations". Since enough opportunities were provided to the Universities, UGC decided to publish the names of defaulting Universities on the UGC website after 31 December 2023, which amounts to public naming and shaming.
Even after the threat of publishing the defaulters list, a total of 157 universities failed to appoint Ombudspersons and hence UGC, as decided earlier, published the names of all such defaulting universities on 17 January 2024.
Despite this public shaming and being put on notice by UGC, as several universities continued to default, UGC again published another list of such defaulting universities on 19 June 2024, urging them again to appoint ombudsperson.
More than a year after the original notification and several reminders and public shaming, even as on 2 July 2024, 62 universities have failed to appoint ombudsman and follow the law of the land. Hence UGC again put them on notice by publishing the defaulters list.
The state-wise defaulting university numbers are:
with Karnataka leading the pack of defaulters.
Further, of the 62 defaulting universities, 74% are State Universities, 10% are State Private Universities, and 16 % are Deemed to be Universities:
It is good to note that all Central Universities have complied with the Regulations. Where as the compliance percentages with respect to State Universities is 90.6%, State Private Universities is 95.6%, and Deemed to be Universities is 97.9%.
It may be concluded that these 62 universities do not care to address the grievances of students, and do not follow the laws of the land.
It is to be noted that the Governors are the Chancellors of State Universities. With respect to the State Private Universities, the Governors are the Visitors and the higher education minister of the state is the Pro Visitor. We have to wait and see what action do the State Governments take on errant State Universities and State Private Universities, as they fall under the control of state governments as per the Acts notified.
The State Universities and the State Private Universities fall under ambit of State Government control.
However ...
Despite the threats of "the matter is being viewed seriously", and "UGC may be constrained to take punitive action(s) against such Universities as per the provisions of the Regulations" on 5 December 2023, UGC itself is yet to take action against 10 defaulting Deemed to be Universities. The Deemed to be Universities fall under the ambit of UGC itself, as they have exitance based on the executive order of UGC, not based on the Act of States / Centre!
Hope to see some action, specially from UGC in near future.
