After uproar, number of Lucknow University PhD seats to rise

By: Vivek Singh Chauhan and Gaurav Dwivedi

LUCKNOW: The number of PhD seats at Lucknow University might go up after being slashed by 20% following new rules. On Tuesday, the vice-chancellor agreed to relax the new rules.


More than 7,000 aspirants had taken the entrance test for 648 PhD seats in November. However, after the test, LU had introduced rules stating that a teacher due to retire in three years won’t be able to guide students and that a seat will be considered vacant only if the exiting student submits a thesis. As a result, the number of seats had gone down by 20% to 514.

On Tuesday, a delegation of LU Teachers’ Association (LUTA), led by its president Neeraj Jain, met VC SP Singh and requested him to hold PhD admissions as per the old rules based on the 2015 ordinance. The VC did not accept LUTA’s demand, but agreed to relax the new rules.

Now, a teacher due to retire in three years will be allowed to take fresh students for research if he/she promises that students currently pursuing PhD under him/her will submit thesis within six months. This will only apply to students whose PhD is near completion. The number of seats falling vacant in the next six months will be included in the current admission process.

Similarly, more seats can be added if teachers with four or more years left for retirement make their PhD students who have completed three years of research work complete their theses in six months.

The teachers have been given time till 11am on Wednesday to submit their applications with declaration. The interview process for admission is scheduled from Thursday.

“The new rules are aimed at improving quality of research work in the university. We have not diluted them, but relaxed for this session on the request of the teachers,” said the VC.

Jain said this relaxation might result in increase of about 50 PhD seats.