National seminar on electoral reforms concludes at ANU
The seminar, designed as part of the innovative BA+MA Public Policy programme provided in-depth insights to students aiming for civil services, making it a landmark event in public policy education.
Addressing the gathering, Senior IPS officer K Chakravarthy emphasised that the BA+MA Public Policy course being offered by Takshasila IAS Academy in collaboration with ANU is a remarkable opportunity for students who wish to prepare for civil services right after intermediate education.
Former Principal Secretary VN Vishnu highlighted the importance of public accountability and the evolving democratic challenges.
The valedictory session was presided over by ANU Vice-Chancellor in-charge Dr Kancherla Gangadhar Rao, Registrar Dr G Simhachalam, Arts & Law College Principal Prof M Suresh Kumar, Public Policy Department Head Prof Battu Nagaraju, and Takshasila IAS Academy Managing Director BSN Durga Prasad.
Faculty members Curie, Chandrika, Ratna Kishore and Prasad were also present.
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Hindustan Times
20 hours ago
- Hindustan Times
‘Operation Sindoor still on, shastra, shaastra both key', says CDS Anil Chauhan
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Time of India
a day ago
- Time of India
Operation Sindoor: Govt says strike was 'measured, non-escalatory'; ceasefire held after Pakistan reached out
Kirti Singh (left), parliament (ANI, PTI) The ministry of external affairs on Thursday informed Parliament that Operation Sindoor was launched in retaliation to "barbaric" assault carried out by "Pakistan-sponsored terrorists," and with the aim to destroy terrorist infrastructure and eliminate terrorists who were believed to be preparing to infiltrate into India. Ministry of state for external affairs Kirti Vardhan Singh,in a written response to questions asked in Rajya Sabha also said India's actions were "focussed, measured and non-escalatory". Samajwadi party MP Ramji Lal Suman, asked the ministry of external affairs whether Operation Sindoor was launched 'under international pressure,' and the 'factual position' in the same. He also went on to ask about the possible impact on the morale of armed forces in the view of "sudden announcement of ceasefire in Operation Sindoor," while the Indian military was "achieving significant success", but suddenly "declaring ceasefire was against their morale and the sentiments of the people of the country". Union MOS Singh in his response said, Operation Sindoor was launched to a "barbaric cross-border terror attack" by Pakistan-sponsored terrorists. It focussed on dismantling terrorist infrastructure and neutralising terrorists likely to be sent across to India". He added, although India's response was 'focused, measured, and non-escalatory,'but 'Pakistan, however, attempted targeting Indian civilian areas, in addition to some military facilities. "These provocations and escalatory actions by Pakistan were met with a strong and decisive response from the Indian armed forces, inflicting significant damage on the Pakistani military. Subsequently, on 10 May, 2025, the director general of military operations of Pakistan approached his Indian counterpart to request for cessation of firing and military activities, which was agreed to later that day," the statement read. As part of Operation Sindoor, India destroyed nine terrorist camps located in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) through precise pre-dawn strikes on May 7. The operation was launched to avenge the April 22 terror attack in Pahalgam. In response to a question on whether India had attempted to "alienate" Pakistan internationally, the MEA clarified that the selection of chairs and vice-chairs for UN security council bodies is part of its routine annual process. For 2025, Pakistan, along with Russia and France, has been appointed a vice-chair of the UN counter terrorism committee. Singh noted that India had chaired this committee in both 2011-12 and 2022. He stated, "the government of India has been sensitising all concerned interlocutors on the menace of cross-border terrorism emanating from Pakistan. Due to India's persistent efforts, the global community has a greater understanding of India's concerns on cross-border terrorism." These efforts, he added, have led to the listing of several Pakistan-based terrorists under the UNSC 1267 sanctions committee and contributed to Pakistan's FATF grey listing. The UNSC also "strongly condemned" the Pahalgam terror attack and stressed accountability for its perpetrators. MOS added, several world leaders have backed India's counter-terrorism efforts post-Pahalgam, with the US recently designating The Resistance Front (TRF), a Lashkar-e-Taiba proxy, as a foreign terrorist organisation. Responding to a separate query about if the government has "formally raised concerns" with the US over ongoing military aid and arms supplies to Pakistan that could be "misused against India", Singh in a written response said that India had "formally raised concerns" with the US over its military aid to Pakistan and monitors all regional security developments closely. He stated, "India has consistently conveyed its concerns in this regard to the United States, with a view to ensuring that these developments do not compromise India's security or regional stability." Reiterating India's stance, he said Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh "are, have been, and will always remain an integral and inalienable part of India." On India-US counter-terrorism cooperation, he added, "counter-terrorism remains a vital pillar of the India-US comprehensive global strategic partnership," with both countries working closely on designations, legal assistance, and extraditions.
Time of India
a day ago
- Time of India
UGC, AICTE, NCTE to be scrapped: Will a new super-regulator end the chaos these three could never control?
India's higher education gears up for a major reset as the proposed Higher Education Commission of India (HECI) aims to replace decades-old regulators—UGC, AICTE, and NCTE—with a single, streamlined authority. India's higher education system—spread across 1,113 universities and 43,796 colleges, according to the AISHE 2021–22—is heading for what may be its most sweeping institutional overhaul since the university system was nationalised. The government has dusted off its reformist rhetoric to dismantle a decades-old triad of regulatory overlords: the University Grants Commission ( UGC ), the All India Council for Technical Education ( AICTE ), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE). In their place, it proposes a singular body—the Higher Education Commission of India (HECI)—tasked with doing everything the other three were supposed to do, but better, faster, and without the administrative clumsiness. This wasn't a bolt from the blue. Policymakers had flagged the chaos earlier too. The National Knowledge Commission (2005–2009) warned of regulatory fragmentation and called for the dismantling of the UGC-AICTE-NCTE triad. It was followed by the Yash Pal Committee Report (2009), which made an even more urgent pitch: 'Multiplicity of regulatory agencies leads to lack of coordination and policy incoherence.' Neither report was fully acted upon. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Gentle Japanese hair growth method for men and women's scalp Hair's Rich Learn More Undo Successive governments chose to tinker, not transform. Then again in 2018, under the Ministry of Human Resource Development (now renamed Ministry of Education), policymakers pitched HECI as a leaner and allegedly more autonomous alternative to the UGC. The concept matured in the National Education Policy 2020, which went a step further—recommending the merger of all three regulators into a single apex commission. One ring to rule them all. At first glance, it sounds like a long-overdue bureaucratic detox. But beneath the calls for efficiency and streamlining lies a deeper story—one of centralised control, collapsed specialisation, and the quiet possibility of academic overreach. Because whenever a government promises to fix complexity with centralisation, it's not just structure that gets rewritten. The soul of the system changes too. So the questions write themselves: Why now? Why one regulator? And who watches the one who watches everyone else? A legacy of silos and silence Historically, India's post-independence higher education system relied on a sector-specific regulatory structure, with different bodies overseeing different streams of education. The University Grants Commission (UGC), established in 1956, was responsible for regulating universities and general higher education institutions. It handled tasks such as funding allocations, curriculum development, and maintaining academic standards across disciplines like arts, science, and commerce. The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), originally set up in 1945 and granted statutory status in 1987, was tasked with overseeing technical and professional education, including engineering, management, architecture, pharmacy, and hotel management. Meanwhile, the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), established in 1995, regulated teacher education programmes, setting norms, granting approvals, and monitoring institutions offering degrees such as and Each of these regulators operated in isolation, with distinct mandates and regulatory frameworks—a model that made sense when disciplines were neatly boxed, institutions were fewer, and regulation meant inspection rather than innovation. But the 21st-century Indian campus is anything but boxed. A single institution may today offer a in AI, a in science pedagogy, and a minor in ethics and literature—and find itself caught in a three-way tug-of-war between regulatory bodies who seldom talk to each other. The result? Not oversight, but overhead. Not accountability, but administrative fatigue. Where did things go wrong? On paper, the tripartite regulatory model—UGC for universities, AICTE for technical education, and NCTE for teacher training—was neat, logical, and compartmentalised. But by the late 2000s, the system began to unravel under the weight of its own silos. India's higher education was evolving, institutions were expanding, disciplines were blending—and the regulators stayed frozen in time. Overlapping jurisdictions, colliding mandates The first cracks appeared when colleges started breaking out of their traditional academic ghettos. A private university might now offer an integrated in Data Science with a liberal arts minor. An institute of education might pair a with environmental studies or STEM modules. Sounds progressive? Yes. But for the regulators, it triggered a turf war. In such cases, the institution had to seek separate approvals from UGC, AICTE, and NCTE—each with its own forms, deadlines, inspections, and (often contradictory) compliance requirements. What followed was: Duplication of compliance: One course. Three sets of paperwork. Dozens of inspections. Conflicting mandates: What AICTE allowed in the name of innovation, UGC might reject as non-conforming. Funding delays: Institutions caught in the crossfire often lost out on timely grants and accreditations. In short, the multi-regulator setup became less about quality assurance and more about bureaucratic endurance. Fragmented quality control While regulatory overlaps created confusion, quality control turned into a blindfolded relay race. All of the three bodies—UGC, AICTE, and NCTE—ran their own accreditation show. They used different metrics, had separate assessor pools, and often reached conflicting conclusions about the same institution. There was: No unified quality benchmark: What counted as 'excellent' for UGC might be sub-par by AICTE standards. Interdisciplinary blind spots: A university with strong arts and tech programmes might ace UGC review but stumble with AICTE red tape. Opaque student experience: For learners navigating cross-disciplinary degrees, the regulatory alphabet soup offered little clarity and even less consistency. At the heart of it, there was no single dashboard, no composite score, no common yardstick for institutional performance. Inefficient governance and regulatory fatigue Beyond structural flaws, each of the three regulators carried its own baggage. UGC, burdened with both funding and monitoring powers, often found itself in a conflicted dual role—allocating grants while also policing quality. This raised perennial questions about fairness, favouritism, and political influence. AICTE, though credited with standardising technical education, developed a reputation for rigidity and red tape. While industries moved toward emerging tech, AICTE's curriculum norms were often several updates behind. NCTE, perhaps the weakest of the three, became infamous for its inability to curb the proliferation of dubious teacher training colleges, especially in smaller towns. The result: thousands of 'recognised' institutes with questionable teaching capacity and negligible placements. What emerged was a governance model where no single body could be held fully accountable, and all three seemed to operate in parallel bureaucracies, rarely in sync, and often in conflict. Enter HECI: What it promises to fix U nlike its predecessors, HECI isn't a one-department show. It's structured around four autonomous verticals, each focused on a distinct function. NHERC: Regulation without redundancy The National Higher Education Regulatory Council (NHERC) will be the front-facing gatekeeper—handling approvals, compliance, and the creation of academic norms. Its job is to bring clarity to the tangled web of regulations by becoming the single-window authority for all higher education institutions (except medical and legal). This means no more running from UGC to AICTE to NCTE for the same degree programme. NAC: Accreditation that speaks one language Accreditation duties will shift to the National Accreditation Council (NAC). Unlike today's fractured system where different bodies use different metrics, NAC is meant to apply a uniform, outcome-based framework for quality assurance. One council, one scale, one yardstick—for all institutions, regardless of discipline. HEGC: Funding that rewards merit The Higher Education Grants Council (HEGC) will take over funding responsibilities from UGC—but with a twist. Instead of discretionary allocations and opaque grants, HEGC is expected to link funding to performance. Think academic outcomes, research impact, graduate employability—not just political connections or compliance checkboxes. GEC: Curriculum that reflects the present Lastly, the General Education Council (GEC) will steer the academic ship. It will define learning outcomes, curricular frameworks, and pedagogical standards across institutions. Its aim is to modernise what's taught and how, making sure Indian students aren't studying for yesterday's job market. What's the real pitch? At its core, HECI is being sold as a regulatory reset—streamlined, centralised, and outcomes-driven, replacing clutter with clarity. One regulator, less bureaucracy Perhaps the biggest headline is administrative simplicity. HECI's integrated model means institutions will no longer bounce between three regulatory bodies. Compliance processes are expected to be leaner, faster, and less redundant. One standard, clearer quality With NAC at the helm, the patchwork of quality assessments will be replaced with a single, transparent accreditation system. Students and parents may finally get a clear, comparable picture of institutional performance. One body, more accountability Instead of UGC blaming AICTE or NCTE washing its hands off quality lapses, HECI creates a unified command. With verticals working in tandem, there's less room for regulatory blame games and more space for system-wide accountability. From control to outcomes HECI is also being pitched as a philosophical shift—from an input-focused, micromanaging bureaucracy to an outcome-driven regulator. In theory, it will care more about results than rules, creating room for greater institutional autonomy. Money follows merit Under HEGC, public funding may finally move toward performance-linked models—rewarding institutions that innovate, publish, and place, rather than simply comply. The goal is to incentivise quality, not paperwork. But HECI isn't a silver bullet: The risks and red flags For all its ambition, HECI carries risks that policymakers cannot afford to ignore: Excessive centralisation Critics fear HECI could become a super-regulator with too much power concentrated at the Centre. If not insulated from political influence, it could be used to enforce ideological conformity across campuses. Loss of domain expertise AICTE and NCTE, for all their flaws, brought specialised understanding of engineering and teacher education. Merging everything under one roof may dilute this expertise unless HECI's verticals are empowered with expert teams. Academic autonomy at risk NEP 2020 advocates 'light but tight' regulation. But if HECI dictates curriculum frameworks, funding norms, and accreditation—all at once—autonomy could become a buzzword, not a reality. Bureaucratic bottlenecks A monolithic body may end up replicating the red tape of its predecessors. Institutional grievances could get lost in the system if not backed by robust grievance redressal mechanisms. So, will HECI deliver? The idea of HECI, on its own, is not the problem. In fact, it reads like a long-overdue footnote to a history of regulatory disarray—one that spans decades of overlapping jurisdictions, incoherent policy mandates, and watchdogs too exhausted to bark. As a concept, it echoes earlier reformist impulses—from the National Knowledge Commission's call for consolidation to the Yash Pal Committee's plea for coherence—both of which gathered dust in government archives while institutional entropy thrived. But as any student of policy will tell you, ideas don't govern—structures do, and structures are only as good as those who operate them. If executed with clarity, autonomy, and genuine insulation from political puppeteering, HECI could finally offer India what the UK has in the Office for Students, or Australia in TEQSA: a regulator that enforces standards without stifling thought, and funds institutions without measuring their worth in compliance checklists. But done badly—and that's not a hypothetical in Indian policy history—it could become yet another monolith with a new acronym and the same old reflexes: delay, dilution, and disinterest in outcomes. New gatekeepers, same revolving doors. As the draft bill inches closer to reality, the real question is not just what HECI abolishes, but what it institutionalises in its place. Because a unified regulator should never become a uniform regulator. And in a democracy that aspires to knowledge leadership, simplification must never come at the cost of dissent, complexity, or intellectual autonomy. TOI Education is on WhatsApp now. Follow us here . 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