SC orders UGC to strengthen the rules against ragging and discrimination on grounds of caste, gender and disability in colleges

In an attempt to bring an end to suicides among students in the country's universities, the Supreme Court on Monday asked the UGC to keep in mind — within two months — while preparing the draft mechanism to effectively deal with ragging, sexual harassment, and caste, gender, disability, and other forms of discrimination.

A two-judge bench of the Supreme Court presided over by Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi was listening to a bunch of PILs brought by Rohit Vemula's mother Radhika Vemula and A Salim Tadvi, mother of Payal Tadvi, against caste-based discrimination in institutions of higher learning.

The Supreme Court on Monday ordered the University Grants Commission (UGC) to take into consideration the recommendations and opinions of Vemula and Tadvi students' mothers, who were alleged to have taken their own lives after being harassed on the basis of their caste in their respective campuses.

It is worth noting that Vemula, a PhD student at Hyderabad Central University, died on 17th January 2016 and Tadvi, an exam student at TN Topiwala National Medical College, died on 22nd May 2019 following alleged discrimination by three doctors at her college.

The Centre's Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who appeared for the Centre, cleared to the court on Monday that the draft rules had been circulated and an expert committee had scrutinized more than 300 objections received.

Mehta's arguments were noted by the bench since the law officer contended that a lot of effective provisions regarding measures to counter ragging and other aspects such as caste prejudices were elaborated.

"These are exclusion of discriminatory behavior, provisions of non-segregation such as exclusion to institutions of higher learning to allocate hostels, classrooms or batches of practice/laboratory based on the rank of admission or performance in academics, and exclusion from public display of merit lists or segregation based on the rank on the campus, and excluding rank-based buddy systems for academic support, which have a tendency to marginalize students from disadvantaged groups," he added further.

In earlier April, the apex court had exempted the UGC to issue the draft regulations 2025, which address ragging, sexual harassment, and caste, gender, disability, among other prejudices in institutions of higher learning.

In PIL on caste discrimination in higher educational institutions, the Supreme Court had previously requested UGC to provide details regarding the number of Central, state, deemed, and private universities and higher educational institutions that have established Equal Opportunity Cells and complaints received under UGC (Promotion of Equity in Higher Educational Institutions) Regulations, 2012, and action taken reports.

The petitioners had approached the top court to prevent caste discrimination in universities and higher educational institutions.

The plea made by mothers of Vemula and Tadvi had sought apt directions from the top court to initiate effective steps to prevent caste discrimination in varsities and higher educational institutions.

The petition also requested that orders be issued to each university and higher learning institution to put on their website all the steps for the eradication of caste discrimination and procedure.

The petition claimed that there have been instances of discrimination based on caste some times. It also said in their appeal that immediate orders and instructions be issued not to practice caste-based discrimination in universities and institutes of higher learning.