In response to a petition challenging Delhi University’s exclusive reliance on CLAT-UG 2023 for admission to its five-year law course, the University Grants Commission (UGC) informed the Delhi high court that this professional degree programme might necessitate unique criteria for student selection. The UGC, in a counter affidavit submitted in the case, urged the dismissal of the petition, according to an official statement.
Delhi University, with the endorsement of its academic council and executive council, had decided to admit students to its integrated law course through the Common Law Admission Test (CLAT). CLAT is a nationally recognised centralised entrance exam, primarily utilised by National Law Universities, the statement mentioned.
Similarly, the central government, which previously stated that the Common University Entrance Test (CUET) was not obligatory for central universities, emphasised that admission standards for professional courses such as engineering, medicine, and law are influenced by their specialised characteristics and distinct skill requirements. Consequently, these standards should be tailored to the unique prerequisites of each course, it added.
“While there are overarching policy guidelines, universities retain the flexibility through their competent bodies i.e. academic councils and executive councils to tailor these guidelines to suit the unique demands of such professional courses,” the centre said. “The National Education Policy (2020) also envisions governance of Higher Education institutions by highly qualified independent Boards having academic and administrative autonomy…the relief as sought by the petitioner to quash the admission notice of University of Delhi may not be granted,” it said.
The petition argues that the requirement lacks a clear distinction and does not have a logical connection with the goal of admitting students to the five-year integrated law courses at the Faculty of Law. It requests that admissions to these courses should instead be conducted through CUET-UG 2023, as per the statement.
CUET-UG 2023 was instituted by the Union Ministry of Education (MoE) for the admission of students to all undergraduate programs in central universities for the academic session 2023-24. Earlier this month, the high court had questioned Delhi University’s decision to admit students to five-year integrated law courses exclusively based on CLAT-UG 2023. The high court remarked that since other central universities were allowing admissions to this program based on CUET UG 2023, introduced by the Ministry of Education, Delhi University should not be treated as “special” in this regard, it said..
With inputs from PTI.