When the present Vice-Chancellor of the University of Delhi, Professor Yogesh Singh, assumed office in October 2021, he introduced two academic reforms in DU: the Four Year Undergraduate Programme (FYUP) and the Common University Entrance Test (CUET) for admissions. The FYUP was introduced in 2022-23 under the University Grants Commision’s Undergraduate Curriculum Framework (UGCF) as part of the National Education Policy 2020.

The FYUP has several problems embedded within the UGCF structure which was a part of the National Higher Educational Qualification Framework (NHEQF) released in January 2022.

The UGCF diluted Core disciplines by reducing the credits and the teaching hours by almost 40%. This led to a reduced weightage of the Core Discipline within the overall structure of the undergraduate programme.

The programme became packed with low-grade courses like Value Added Courses (VAC), Skill Enhancement Courses (SEC) and Ability Enhancement Courses (AEC): none of which has any bearing on the Core disciplines pursued by the students. Most of these courses have substandard content prepared not by the departments but by nominated committees of the University administration. A VAC course like Swachh Bharat, a government scheme, is taught to students across disciplines as a propaganda exercise. Moreover, students are denied the opportunity to study English as an AEC, which compromises their employment opportunities in the global market.

The FYUP was introduced with a focus on undergraduate research, which is undermined by a contradictory course structure. The students lose time in the first two years of their UG programme in subpar non-Core courses instead of developing research acumen in their Core subjects. A research topic is decided after having a thorough, focused, and rigorous exposure to a discipline; the same training is not available to the students under FYUP owing to no concerted planning or efforts in the direction.

DU completed its first batch of FYUP students in May-June 2026: when around 30% of the original number of the students admitted in 2022 stayed back to complete the fourth year. The experience of the students and the teachers in the fourth year was dismal, with new notifications coming every fortnight about the modalities, underlining the unpreparedness of the programme.

There was no infrastructure nor funds assigned for the fourth-year students. Colleges had to manage within the existing resources of the classroom, timetable and teaching staff. The Science departments witnessed minimum enrollment in the fourth year, since no new laboratory facilities were created for the purpose.

Moreover, the supervision of dissertations was not included in the workload of teachers, thus forcing them to work beyond the stipulated hours of teaching and learning.

In the current academic year 2026-27, enrollment has dropped significantly in the fourth year to hardly 10% of the original number. Students are now opting for postgraduate programme of two years or moving out to other fields. Owing to the reduction in the number of students in the fourth year, the DU administration promoted the idea of cluster classes as a solution to resource crunch in the fourth year.

The first batch of students who did the fourth year was promised admission to the one-year Master’s programme, but very few could make it because of limited seats. Some students who did not get a seat ended up joining a two-year Master’s programme after doing the fourth year; they have lost one year through no fault of theirs.

The DU administration has also introduced the policy of direct admission to Ph.D. after the fourth year. The NEP, having discontinued the M.Phil as a pre-doctoral degree, has already put young researchers at a disadvantage. Now if the students are plunged into research without pursuing a rigorous postgraduate programme, they will not be at par with the research scholars who have come through the grind of a rigorous UG and PG programmes, thus putting their academic future in jeopardy.

As part of NEP, the Delhi University has fast tracked these structural reforms to expedite the autonomy of all the constituent colleges by 2030. An alarming trend is already visible: middle class parents and several DU teachers have begun sending their children to private Universities as they no longer trust the quality of the degree in DU owing to the mediocrity of the syllabi and the course structure.

The fourth year was added in the FYUP to align the UG course structure in the Indian Universities with the Universities abroad: so that the rich students could go to there for higher studies. However with the geopolitical changes and the looming uncertainties owing to the global recession, the charm of studying abroad is reduced. Hence the students are seriously stuck in the FYUP: their degree is delayed by a year and their opportunities abroad have shrunk.

If academic reforms are steamrolled without any consultation with the stakeholders, they are bound to come a cropper. The FYUP and the UGCF in DU are a glaring example of the same: since they have been implemented without thorough feasibility studies and allocation of resources.

(Rudrashish Chakraborty is an Associate Professor of English at Kirori Mal College, Delhi University. Views expressed are personal.)