New Delhi: Students completing four-year undergraduate programmes at the University of Delhi will now be eligible to directly pursue a PhD under amended regulations approved by the Academic Council on Friday.
The decision was among a series of measures cleared at the meeting of the Academic Council (AC), which also approved renaming the School of Open Learning (SOL) as the Centre for Distance and Online Education (CDOE), instituting a scholarship in the name of former Union minister Arun Jaitley and introducing new academic programmes.
The amendments to the PhD regulations were approved after the AC considered recommendations of the Research, Innovation and Entrepreneurship Council (RIEC). Under the revised norms, students who have completed a four-year undergraduate degree will be eligible to enrol in doctoral programmes, with the necessary provisions also receiving the council's approval.
However, some AC members submitted a dissent note, arguing that the amended ordinance does not clearly specify how reservation norms would apply to four-year undergraduate students becoming eligible for direct PhD admission. They contended that these students have been clubbed with master's and MPhil degree holders despite constituting a distinct category, raising concerns that reservation provisions could be compromised.
The dissent note, signed by AC members Maya John and Latika Gupta, also questioned the provision limiting university-funded non-JRF fellowships to 16+1 candidates per department, saying it remained unclear how other full-time PhD scholars without fellowships would support their research.
They demanded that reservation norms for direct-entry undergraduate candidates be explicitly defined and that research support be extended to all non-JRF scholars.
The AC also approved renaming the School of Open Learning as the Centre for Distance and Online Education (CDOE) to align the university with the University Grants Commission's 2022 regulations governing institutions offering distance and online education. The designation of the head of the institution will also change from principal to director.
Another key decision was the institution of the 'Late Shri Arun Jaitley' scholarship for undergraduate sports students. Three scholarships with a combined annual value of Rs 50,000 will be awarded every year for 20 years from a corpus of Rs 10 lakh, with at least one scholarship reserved for a female student. The inaugural award ceremony is proposed to be held on August 13.
The council also approved the introduction of a certificate course and diploma course in Sanskrit Buddhism in the Department of Buddhist Studies from the 2026-27 academic session. It further cleared the launch of a Master of Occupational Therapy (MOT) programme at the Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya National Institute for Persons with Physical Disabilities from the same academic session.
In addition, the council approved five new Skill Enhancement Courses under the Undergraduate Curriculum Framework (UGCF) 2022. These include courses on entrepreneurial mindset, design thinking, venture development, entrepreneurial communication and investor pitching and library and information literacy skills.
During the meeting, members also congratulated Vice-Chancellor Yogesh Singh on his reappointment for a second term, the first such instance in the university's history. Singh said Delhi University had improved its position in the QS World University Rankings 2027 to 322 from the 521-530 band in 2022, making it the highest-ranked Indian university in the rankings.
This report was published from a syndicated wire feed. Apart from the headline, the EdexLive Desk has not edited the copy.
