New Delhi: The University Grants Commission (UGC) has notified revised norms for PhD admission. With this, candidates with a four-year bachelor’s degree and research and a minimum 7.5 CGPA will be eligible for admission to PhD programmes under the new norms.
The higher education regulator, in a notification, said there will be a status quo in terms of the procedure of admissions. The eligibility criteria have been revised after the discontinuation of the MPhil programme as per National Education Policy 2020, and the introduction of four-year undergraduate programmes.
First and second-year post-graduate students (after completing a four-year programme) will also be eligible. Candidates pursuing or having completed MPhil will continue to remain eligible for admission to PhD programmes.
The new norms have done away with the mandatory requirement of publishing research papers in peer-reviewed journals for the submission of PhD thesis.
Under the revised norms, faculty members with less than three years of service before superannuation shall not be allowed to supervise new research scholars. They allow each supervisor to guide up to two international research scholars on a supernumerary basis over and above the permitted number of PhD scholars they can supervise.
The higher education institutes have been allowed to decide their own selection procedure for PhD admission of international students keeping in view the guidelines/norms in this regard issued by statutory/regulatory bodies.
According to the new regulations, a 5% relaxation has also been provided in eligibility criteria for the economically weaker sections.
On the other hand, a proposal to reserve 60% of the seats for the National Eligibility Test/Junior Research Fellowship holders in all higher education institutions has been dropped.
“It was not considered keeping in mind the suggestions of the stakeholder,” said UGC chairperson M Jagadesh Kumar.
