Distance PhD bar off

The University Grants Commission (UGC) has lifted its two-year-old ban on MPhil and PhD courses through correspondence, the U-turn apparently forced by legal opinion against the move following protests from universities. Open universities like Ignou and several general universities had protested the ban on the ground that their respective laws, passed by Parliament or legislatures, allowed them to offer such courses. Ignou had even continued to offer such programmes. Faced with the resistance, the higher education regulator sought legal opinion on whether it could override such powers conferred by the acts to the universities. Last month, the UGC held a meeting where it was decided to drop the ban. “An open university may be permitted to conduct MPhil/PhD programmes through distant education mode subject to condition that it does so strictly as per the provisions of the UGC Regulations,” said the minutes of the meeting. “We will follow the rules but our regulations are already stricter than those of the UGC,” Ignou vice-chancellor Rajasekharan Pillai said today. UGC norms lay down several criteria, including course work, evaluation of thesis by experts outside the state and viva voce. While the PhD guidelines of the most central universities were similar to the UGC’s regulation, those of several open and state universities had a lot of deviations. The UGC has put another condition for Phd — the principal guide should be from the open university. The UGC had clamped the bar by notifying a rule — the Minimum Standards and Procedure for Awards of MPhil/PhD Degree Regulation — in 2009 saying research courses in the distant mode were of poor quality. The regulations had put a question mark on the future of nearly 10,000 students pursuing such courses across the country. “There should not be any blanket ban on MPhil or PhD in distance mode. If institutions meet the required quality parameters, they should be allowed to offer such courses,” said academic M. Madhava Menon, who has been asked by the HRD ministry to draft a policy on distance education. He said he would submit his report next month. Another concern has been that some of the open universities do not have adequate infrastructure to help students carry out research for such courses. A UGC official said the commission’s regulations were silent on the facilities, and a panel headed by academic S.P. Thyagrajan had been set up to suggest the requirements. “We will meet on September 15 to lay the guidelines,” Thyagrajan said.