Private Universities Establishments Registration Process

Narendra Kumar

09 Oct, 2019

Guidelines for Establishments of Private Universities

Private Universities mean a university duly established through a Central or State Act and which is governed by the provisions mentioned in the UGC Act, 1956^[1] as per the respective state acts. A sponsoring body can submit the proposal for the establishment of Private University which can be a–

(a) Society Registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860

(b) Public Trust Registered under the Indian Trusts Act, 1882or

(c) Company registered under Sec 8 Companies Act, 2013.

What is the Registration Process?

The application must be submitted for setting up a Private Universities along with the detailed proposal to the Department of Higher Education with a demand draft of Rs. 1 lakh in favor of the Director, Higher Education. In the case of State Private Universities, it must be submitted to the concerned department and also the provisions mentioned in the UGC Act 1956 must be followed. The UGC will grant the authorization to State Private Universities.

The proposal must contain the following particulars namely:

• Details of the sponsoring body along with the registration certificate and bye-laws of the society
• The name, location, and headquarters of the proposed university
• The objectives of the university
• Nature and the type of program of study, training, research, etc
• The proposed fee structure and other concessions if any
• The system proposed for selecting the students for admission
• The details of the plans for campus development
• The procedure for recruiting the professor and defining the role based on the eligible criteria
• Details of various other activities like sports, culture programs, playgrounds, etc.
• Various other details like the examination schedule and the procedure for conducting the exam.

The issue of the letter of intent

Once the application is submitted with the detailed proposal to the department, will review the application and if satisfied that it is advisable to establish a University, it may issue a letter of intent within one month of the submission of the report by the Inspection Committee and will ask the sponsoring body to establish an Endowment Fund with Rs. 5 crore for single domain and Rs.8 crore for multi-domain for the university which shall be pledged to the government. The amount may be increased by notification issued by the State Government from time to time. The Sponsoring body must acquire at least 10 acres of land for its main campus if it is single domain and 25 acres of land if it is multi-domain. The campus must have the facilities such as auditorium, cafeteria, library, laboratories, computer lab, etc.

Compliance Reporting

The sponsoring body shall within a period of 2 years submit to the State government a compliance report along with necessary documents that the conditions mentioned in the letter of intent have been fulfilled. On receiving the application the state government shall form a committee to verify the compliance report and scrutinize the report. If the committee has any queries or recommendations that the deficiencies must be removed and recommended compliance must be communicated by way of report to the committee. The Committee will submit its report to the State government specifying that all the requirements and conditions laid down in a letter of intent have been fulfilled.

Enactment of law for Private University

After receiving the satisfactory recommendations of the committee the state government will place a separate act for a particular private university before the state legislature for its approval. The state legislature will then pass a separate act for the establishment and incorporation of the particular private university and issue a gazette notification. The said notification will be sent to UGC and the sponsoring body will be further required to make an application to UGC to list the newly incorporated university in the UGC list of authorized universities. The university must meet the norms, notifications, and guidelines issued by UGC from time to time.