Vacant faculty post will not be de-reserved, says UGC Chairperson

The draft provision allowing “de-reservation” of faculty vacancy meant for the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes, and the Other Backward Classes in Central universities will not be part of the final guidelines, University Grants Commission (UGC) Chairperson M. Jagadesh Kumar said on Sunday evening, hours after the provision drew severe backlash from the academic community and activists across the country.

It proposed that vacancy reserved for SC, ST, and OBC candidates can be declared unreserved if enough candidates from these categories are not available.

Mr. Kumar said it was just a “final draft” and that it would be revised and corrected after analysing the public feedback on the document. “There is nothing like de-reservation and there will not be any de-reservation. The entire draft guidelines are meant for feedback, After that, there will always be corrections in the guidelines and then the final guidelines will come. As far as de-reservation is concerned, that will not be part of final guidelines,” he told presspersons.