The University Grants Commission, which regulates higher education in the country, and the All India Council for Technical Education are not being merged into a single regulatory body. “No such proposal is under consideration at present,” Minister of State for Human Resource Development Mahendra Nath Pandey said on Thursday in a written reply to a Rajya Sabha question.
In June, there were reports that the Centre would scrap the two bodies, and replace them with a single apex body. It was even tentatively named Higher Education Empowerment Regulation Agency, or Heera.
The decision was taken after a meeting in March that was chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, according to the Economic Times. The report also said that the government’s policy think tank Niti Aayog was working with the ministry of human resource development to frame a new law.
However, Pandey’s response also pointed out that the “idea of establishing a single regulator for higher education is not new” and that several committees have recommended the creation of a single apex regulatory body or institution.
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