Segregation, Misunderstood: In Defence of Clause 7(d) of the 2026 UGC Regulations

Introduction

The Supreme Court (“Court”), in its interim order staying the University Grants Commission (Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions) Regulations, 2026 (“2026 Regulations”), framed five “substantial questions of law”, including - among others - whether the inclusion of the expression “segregation” in Clause 7(d) could amount to a “separate yet equal” classification infringing constitutional guarantees of equality and fraternity. 

Notably, Clause 7(d) was not, at least on the record, a focus of the petitioner’s challenge. The concern appears to have been raised by the Court suo moto.

The Anxiety with “Segregation”

“Segregation”, in its most basic sense, denotes the enforced separation of groups within shared civic, social, or institutional spaces on the basis of race, sex, or religion. With time, it has come to describe a structured system of hierarchy where separation is backed by law, justified by claims of difference, and sustained through material inequality. 

In the United States, the doctrine of “separate but equal” was crystallised in Plessy v. Ferguson, wherein state-mandated racial segregation was upheld on the fiction that formal parity of facilities satisfied the Equal Protection Clause. The result was the Jim Crow regime, which produced racially divided schools, transport, housing, and public accommodations - all nominally equal yet systematically unequal in resources, access, and dignity. Nearly six decades later, when the U.S. Supreme Court reversed course in Brown v. Board of Education, it did so on the insight that enforced separation in public education was inherently unequal because it generated stigma and stamped Black children with a badge of inferiority. 

And so, the Court’s anxiety is, to be fair, understandable. The semantic charge the term carries has accrued through repeated association with systems that converted separation into hierarchy. The question, however, is whether that historical memory should control interpretation when the word appears within a materially different regulatory design.

In Defence of Clause 7(d)

Clause 7(d) of the 2026 Regulations provides:

“Higher Education Institutions shall ensure that any selection, segregation, or allocation for the purpose of hostels, classrooms, mentorship groups, or any other academic purposes is transparent, fair, and non-discriminatory.”

Properly read, Clause 7(d) appears to be neither an authorisation of segregation nor a flirtation with “separate yet equal.” It is a safeguard simpliciter. The provision states that any “selection, segregation, or allocation” for hostels, classrooms, mentorship groups, or other academic purposes must be “transparent, fair, and non-discriminatory.” The operative word is not separation, but discipline in the face of being transparent and without prejudice or bias. The clause recognises that higher education institutions inevitably organise students across space (eg. rooms are allotted, mentorship cohorts assembled, etc) and insists that such organisation must not reproduce prohibited hierarchies.

The inclusion of the word “segregation” does not create a new power. It acknowledges an existing institutional reality wherein students are sorted, clustered, and allocated for multiple reasons, which can sometimes, very well just be logistical. In a caste-stratified society, these processes might not always be neutral. Spatial arrangements can reflect and entrench social divisions even in the absence of explicit intent. Hostel allotments, informal grouping practices, or mentorship allocations may inadvertently track social background. Clause 7(d) brings these practices within the ambit of an equality review. It renders them visible and therefore regulable.

And thus, to conflate this with the logic of “separate but equal” is to overlook the difference between enforced separation as an instrument of domination and regulated allocation as an administrative necessity. In the former, the state mandates classification on prohibited grounds. In the latter, institutions perform ordinary organisational functions, now subject to equality constraints. 

The clause reflects an anti-subordination impulse. It recognises that equality in educational institutions cannot be confined to admissions and examinations; it must extend to how institutional space is structured. If spatial organisation becomes a vehicle for isolation or exclusion, the promise of equal participation is hollowed out. By placing allocation practices under an explicit equality obligation, Clause 7(d) seeks to prevent precisely that outcome.

A Brief Endnote

The validity of Clause 7(d) ultimately turns on the method of judicial approach. If adjudication proceeds by isolating historically charged text from the design and objective of the Regulations, it risks converting memory into reflex. But if it proceeds by examining structure, purpose, and social context, the analysis shall look markedly different. Clause 7(d) neither mandates separation nor legitimises hierarchy – it subjects allocation to equality discipline. That is not a regression into “separate but equal,” but an attempt (and a rather modest one) to ensure that the organisation of space within universities does not replicate entrenched social divisions.