Amend PhD regulations to help poor, marginalised students: OBC students’ body urges UGC

NEW DELHI: The All India OBC Students Association (AIOBCSA) has requested the University Grants Commission (UGC) to amend draft PhD regulations, 2022 to make education institutions more inclusive and empower poor and marginalized students.

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The Students’ organisation has pointed out some issues with draft PhD regulations and sent recommendations to UGC on amendments in the regulations which include:

• 100% weightage to interview for the National Eligibility Test (NET) or Junior Research Fellowship (JRF) qualified candidates will create problems for the Scheduled Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST), Other Backward Classes (OBC), Economically Weaker Section (EWS) and Persons with Disabilities (PwD) students. The scores obtained in NET or JRF shall be given weightage for final selection along with the interview.
• Use of the None Found Suitable (NFS) in interviews inspite of the required number of applications in respective categories must be banned in both NET, JRF and entrance exams.
• Filling of reserved seats with other reserved or unreserved candidates will drastically impact the prospects of the marginalized sections. The unfilled reserved vacancy must be carried over to the next PhD admission session or filled through a special drive.
• As there are issues of anomalies in giving of marks to unreserved and reserved category candidates in interviews, the draft regulations must address them. In several universities, reserved category students are getting lesser marks in interviews despite getting good marks in written exams. The written exam marks should not be disclosed to the interview panel. The issue of huge differences in scores of written exams and interviews must be addressed in the reserved categories grievance cell.
• The universities must declare entrance exam results in the public domain to ensure transparency and accountability of the admission process.
• As MPhil programme has been discontinued from the last academic year, the PhD seats must be increased for the posts of professor, assistant professor and associate professor to 10, 6, and 8.