UGC: In Modern View

In his speech, Shri Vajpayee spoke of the need to take a fresh look at the UGC Act, 1956 in the light of the new challenges for the education sector emerging in the twenty-first century.

He also suggested that the Commission could consider changing its name to the `University Education Development Commission”. This name truly captures the changed role of the UGC in recent years.

Traditionally, UGC was entrusted with the task of co-ordination, formulation and maintenance of the standards of university education. To this end, it engaged itself in, among other things, framing regulations on minimum standards of education, determining standards of teaching, examination and research in universities, monitoring developments in the field of collegiate and university education, disbursing grants to universities and colleges and setting up common facilities, services and programmes for a group of universities in the form of Inter-University Centers.