The Supreme Court on Thursday stayed the latest UGC regulations against caste discrimination that exclude general-category students from its complaint and redress mechanism, citing its “vague” wording and liability to “divide society” and generate “misuse”.
“If we don’t interfere... it will lead to a dangerous impact and will divide society,” Chief Justice Surya Kant, at the head of a bench that included Justice Joymalya Bagchi, said.
The court added: “Some of the provisions of the… regulations suffer from certain ambiguities, and the possibility of their misuse cannot be ruled out.”
Directing the Centre to keep the University Grants Commission (Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions) Regulations, 2026, “in abeyance”, the bench underlined a mismatch between Sections 3(c) and 3(e).
While 3(c) defines “caste-based discrimination” as discrimination “only” on the basis of caste or tribe against the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and OBCs, 3(e) defines “discrimination” as any unfair or biased treatment of anyone on the grounds of religion, race, caste, gender, birthplace and disability.
“How does Section 3(c) become relevant when Section 3(e) is existing? When 3(c) is already ingrained in 3(e), why bring it as a separate provision?” the court said, underlining that 3(c) denies protection to the upper castes, and them alone.
It also asked whether the regulations’ silence on “ragging” — a menace the 2012 regulations addressed — was regressive.
Using its extraordinary powers, the top court restored till further orders the UGC regulations of 2012, which mention only SCs and STs in matters of caste discrimination.
It asked the Centre to set up a committee of experts, including jurists, to examine the 2026 regulations.
The court issued notices to the Centre and the UGC, and posted the next hearing to March 19, when a three-judge bench would hear it.
It directed that a petition filed in 2019 by the mothers of Rohith Vemula and Payal Tadvi — both allegedly driven to suicide by caste harassment on their campuses — be tagged with the present case.
The bench reacted with horror to Section 7(d), which says any caste-based segregation of hostels or classrooms should be done with transparency and without discrimination.
“For God’s sake, don’t do this. We all used to stay together,” the bench said. “…We have achieved a lot in terms of casteless society; are we now becoming a regressive society?”
Senior advocate Indira Jaising, who had represented the Vemula and Tadvi families, opposed the stay on the 2026 regulations.
A batch of public interest pleas — moved by a PhD scholar from BHU, advocate Vineet Jindal and a petitioner named Rahul Dewan — have challenged the new regulations’ constitutional validity.
They have disputed the regulations’ alleged assumption that caste discrimination is necessarily unidirectional and cannot afflict the upper castes.
Posing a hypothetical scenario, Justice Kant asked whether Section 3(e), with its wider definition of “discrimination”, would protect a south Indian student in a north Indian institution if the two parties’ caste identities remain unknown.
Advocate Vishnu Jain, appearing for one of the petitioners, said it would.
The court said it “prima facie” held that several “substantial questions of law” involving the regulations needed “detailed examination”, such as:
- The 3(c) and 3(e) mismatch.
- Whether the expression “segregation” in Clause 7(d), relating to the allocation of hostels, classrooms and mentorship groups, amounted to a “separate yet equal” classification, violating the constitutional right to equality and the Preamble to the Constitution.
- Whether the omission of ragging as a specific form of discrimination, despite its existence in the 2012 regulations, was a regressive move.