PhD not mandatory for assistant prof recruitment for this year: Govt

 The Centre has decided to put on hold the plan to make PhD a minimum qualification for recruitment of assistant professors for this year in view of the Covid-19 pandemic. The University Grants Commission (UGC) in 2018 set the criteria for recruitments for entry-level posts at universities and colleges. It had given a three-year window to candidates to complete their PhDs and asked all universities and colleges to start applying the criteria for recruitment from the 2021-22 academic session. Due to the pandemic, many candidates could not complete their PhDs and were appealing to the government to relax the eligibility this year.

“The government has decided to put on hold the mandatory PhD requirement for assistant professors post for this year. We were receiving a lot of requests from candidates who wanted to apply for the post but were unable to fulfil their PhD requirement,” Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan said.

Candidates with postgraduate degrees, who have cleared the National Eligibility Test, will continue to remain eligible for recruitments to the post. “The UGC will soon release a circular to all higher education institutions regarding this decision. It will help colleges and universities to quickly fill all the vacant seats,” said an official, who did not want to be named.

In September, Pradhan asked all the central universities to fill the 6000-odd teaching vacancies by the end of October.