{"id":79485,"date":"2026-07-17T17:50:59","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T12:20:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=79485"},"modified":"2026-07-17T17:59:37","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T12:29:37","slug":"vbsa-bill-autonomy-risks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/17-07-2026\/vbsa-bill-autonomy-risks","title":{"rendered":"Panel Flags Autonomy Risks under VBSA Bill"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS2\/Education\/Governance<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The joint parliamentary committee has noted that the <strong>Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025<\/strong> will lead to the <strong>concentration of extensive regulatory powers in a single central regulator.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Key Features of the Bill<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Regulatory Body: <\/strong>\u00a0The Bill establishes the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan (the Commission) as an apex regulatory authority for higher education.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>It replaces the University Grants Commission (UGC)<strong>, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE). <\/strong>The Commission will comprise the Regulatory, Accreditation, and Standards Councils.\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It will regulate <strong>technical education, teacher-training, and architecture education.<\/strong>\u00a0 Other professional courses, such as medicine and law have been excluded from its purview.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Composition of the Commission: <\/strong>\u00a0The Commission will consist of a Chairperson and up to<strong> 12 members.<\/strong>\u00a0 Members include:\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Presidents of the three Councils,<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The higher education secretary of the central government,<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The five eminent experts, and\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Two eminent academicians from state HEIs. The Chairperson will be selected by the central government.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Composition of the Councils: <\/strong>\u00a0Each Council will consist of <strong>14 members<\/strong> headed by a President.\u00a0 Members will include eminent experts, one nominee of the Union Department of Higher Education, and nominees of the other two Councils.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Functions of the Councils: The Regulatory Council<\/strong> will be responsible for establishing and ensuring compliance with minimum standards for setting up an HEI, facilitating the autonomy of HEIs in a timely manner, and addressing grievances received from stakeholders against HEIs.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The Standards Council <\/strong>will be responsible for framing learning outcomes for higher education programmes, and minimum academic standards for HEIs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The Accreditation Council<\/strong> will be responsible for developing an accreditation framework and system for HEIs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Removal of members:\u00a0 <\/strong>The Chairperson, Presidents, or any full-time members of the Commission or the Councils may be removed on grounds of; insolvency, conviction of offence involving moral turpitude, physical or mental incapacity, or abuse of powers.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Right to confer degrees: <\/strong>\u00a0Degrees may be granted only by:\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>A university (established by a central or state Act or deemed under the <strong>UGC Act, 1956<\/strong>), or\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>An institution specially empowered by a central Act, or<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Other HEIs authorised by the Regulatory Council with the prior approval of the central government.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Key Issue of the Bill<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Autonomy of HEIs:<\/strong> The Bill\u2019s provisions may not significantly improve the autonomy of higher education institutions (HEIs). In some cases, autonomy already granted to HEIs may be rolled back.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Currently,<strong> institutes of national importance<\/strong> are governed under their specific laws, with academic and research autonomy.\u00a0 The Bill brings such institutes under the purview of the Commission and its Councils.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The Committee expressed apprehension that concentration of extensive regulatory powers in a single central regulator could lead to bureaucratic or ideological overreach, thereby affecting institutional autonomy.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Funding:<\/strong> Allocating and granting funds is a key function of the UGC.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Bill does not include this as a function of the Commission or its Councils.\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The National Education Policy (NEP), 2020 <\/strong>had recommended setting up a single regulator with four verticals for regulation, accreditation, funding, and standard setting.\u00a0 <strong>The Bill sets up three of these, excluding funding.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The Bill treats professional courses inconsistently.<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Technical, management, and teacher education<\/strong> will come under the VBSA Commission.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Architecture education<\/strong> will be regulated by the Commission, while the Council of Architecture will continue as a professional body.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Medical, legal,<\/strong> and certain other professional courses remain outside its ambit.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Penalty: <\/strong>The committee noted that the bill has proposed a graded penalty architecture but flagged that penalties cannot be imposed arbitrarily by the Regulatory Council.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Appeals against decisions of the Councils <\/strong>will be made to the central government.\u00a0 This is unlike the procedure for other regulators, such as SEBI and TRAI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Grounds for <strong>removal of part-time members<\/strong> not provided.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Recommendations by the Committee<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Filling Vacancies: <\/strong>The ministry shall frame appropriate rules to ensure that the process for filling predictable vacancies, such as those arising from retirement or superannuation, is initiated at least<strong> six months in advance<\/strong> and completed within <strong>90 days of the occurrence of the vacancy.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The committee accepted that the presidents and full-time members of the council be appointed by the <strong>President of India on the recommendation of the search-cum-selection committee.<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Other Members of the Commission and the Councils <\/strong>may be appointed by the <strong>Central Government rather than by the President of India.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Presently many central institutions are suffering because of delay in appointment of the Members and the involvement of a long gestation of time period.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: TH<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong> Context <\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> The joint parliamentary committee has noted that the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025 will lead to the concentration of extensive regulatory powers in a single central regulator. <\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong> Key Features of the Bill <\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> Regulatory Body: \u00a0The Bill establishes the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan (the Commission) as an apex regulatory authority for higher education. <\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"> It replaces the University Grants Commission (UGC), All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE). The Commission will comprise the Regulatory, Accreditation, and Standards Councils.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/li>\n<p><a href=\" https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/17-07-2026\/vbsa-bill-autonomy-risks \" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-79485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79485"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79488,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79485\/revisions\/79488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}