As per UGC Secretary Rajnish Jain, the commission has given the nod to the proposal for simultaneous dual degrees for students in India, allowing them to complete courses in the same or different stream at the same time. However, one of the degrees has to be in the regular mode and the other either in open and distance learning or online mode.
The official notification in this regard will be issued soon by commission, he added.
Last year, UGC set up a panel headed by its Vice Chairman, Bhushan Patwardhan, which was formed to examine the issue of pursuing two degree programs simultaneously from the same university or different universities either through distance mode, online mode or part-time mode.
The UGC had set up a committee in 2012 as well and discussions were held on the matter but ultimately the idea was junked. The committed was headed by the then Vice Chancellor of the Hyderabad University Furqan Qamar, who recommended that students enrolled in a regular degree program should be allowed to pursue another degree program at the same time through open or distance mode from the same or a different university
The panel report had then said, “However, two-degree programs under regular mode may not be allowed simultaneously as it may create logistic, administrative and academic problems. A student pursuing a degree program under regular mode may be allowed to pursue a maximum of one certificate, diploma, advanced diploma, PG diploma program simultaneously either in regular or open and distance mode in the same university or from other institutions.”