SC Issues Stay On Odisha Universities (Amendment) Act, 2020

Bhubaneswar: The Supreme Court on Friday issued a stay on Odisha Universities (Amendment) Act, 2020.

The apex court issued the stay for three months after hearing a petition filed against the Act by University Grants Commission (UGC). The court sought a reply from the Odisha government in three months and set the date for next hearing on the matter after two months.

Earlier, the Orissa High Court had given a clean chit to the state government by upholding the validity of the Act.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) and Prof Mohanty had moved the Supreme Court challenging the decision of the high court. The UGC contended that the state law is in conflict with the UGC Regulation-2018 issued under University Grant Commission Act, 1956.

UGC’s Education Officer Dr Supriya Dahiya has filed an affidavit in response to notices issued by the court on two separate PILs.

The petitions filed by retired professor Ajit Kumar Mohanty of Jawaharlal Nehru University and professor Kunja Bihari Panda of Utkal University had challenged the constitutional validity of the Act which was notified on November 9, 2020.

The UGC in a batch of writ petitions in the High Court stated that the Act is repugnant to the UGC (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment of Teachers and other Academic Staff in Universities and Colleges and other Measures for the Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) Regulations, 2018 that govern the minimum qualification of teachers, manner of appointing VCs and other service conditions of teaching and non-teaching staff.

The provisions of the Act are violative of the relevant provisions of the UGC regulations in respect of selection and appointment as vice-chancellors and teaching faculty in the universities, it maintained.

The High Court, in its judgment held that the UGC (Minimum Qualifications for Appointment of Teachers and other Academic Staff in Universities and Colleges and other Measures for the Maintenance of Standards in Higher Education) Regulations, 2018 are not binding on state universities in Odisha and that such universities would be governed by the Orissa Universities Act, 1989 (as amended in 2020) rather than the UGC’s Regulations of 2018.

The UGC in its special leave petition in the Supreme Court stated that as per UGC Regulations, 2018, which are mandatory, every university or institution deemed to be university shall take effective steps for the amendment of the statutes, ordinances or other statutory provisions governing it, so as to bring the same in accordance with these regulations. Hence, the Odisha Universities (Amendment) Act, 2020 is violative of the UGC Regulations 2018 and therefore the judgment of the High Court was erroneous, the Commission mentioned in its petition in apex court.