6 years after Payal Tadvi’s death, UGC rules in focus, mother says ‘still struggling to be heard’

That petition is what led to the UGC (Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions) Regulations, 2026 — now at the centre of a nationwide controversy after being notified on January 13 and stayed by the Supreme Court two days ago.

The 2026 Regulations sought to strengthen safeguards for students like Payal and Rohith from marginalised communities, including by mandating Equal Opportunity Centres, fixing accountability on heads of institutions, and strengthening complaint redressal mechanisms. They were framed, in part, to address gaps in the 2012 regulations, which Abeda and Radhika had argued were routinely ignored.

However, the new rules were challenged by petitioners who contended that they excluded students from the general category, and were vague and prone to misuse. While placing the new rules in abeyance, the Supreme Court also raised four key questions: how will they address ragging in relation to caste; why separate hostels to deal with caste bias; when discrimination is already defined in one subsection, why a separate definition; and, won’t provisions, with vague language, be misused.

“I hope the stay does not mean going back altogether on the regulations. They were formulated after many hearings over the past few years and consultations with experts. We were hoping that it will bring much needed changes in education institutions,” Abida said.

She described measures such as equity centres and committees to ensure implementation of the new rules as “good mechanisms to ensure students do not face any form of discrimination”. She also expressed the hope that the regulations are brought into force soon, noting that more such suicides have been reported since Payal’s death.

For Abeda, the debate is also inseparable from the memory of her daughter’s last months.

“I was proud of Payal, she was the first woman in our community to pursue a post-graduation in the medical field. If the institutional mechanisms had been in place then, she would have had redressal for her complaints. Instead of feeling deterred to even speak about what she was facing for fear of further discrimination like many students with similar backgrounds, she would have been successful in her work and our support now. Now, I am left struggling for justice on all fronts, grieving for her like she passed away yesterday,” Abeda said.

Payal, a postgraduate gynaecology student at TN Topiwala National Medical College and BYL Nair Hospital in Mumbai, was found dead in her hostel room on May 22, 2019. She had told her mother about daily harassment by seniors, including alleged taunts for having secured admission under the ST quota as a member of the Tadvi Bhil community. Abeda approached the head of the department, who later claimed she was not informed of casteist remarks.

Abeda says her daughter was never guided to any redressal mechanism for SC/ST students, nor was action taken under the 2012 UGC regulations, which explicitly list discrimination through labelling students as “reserved category”.

“We felt that if this happened to our children, Payal and Rohith, who wanted to study and despite existing rules for their safeguard, there was no implementation, we had to take some steps towards changing that. Radhikaji also did not know of all these rules before she lost her son, nor did I. But we came together in the hope to improve the system so that other parents do not suffer like we are suffering,” Abeda said. Radhika Vemula declined to speak on the issue.

Nearly six years after Payal’s death, the trial against three doctors — Bhakti Mehare, Ankita Khandelwal and Hema Ahuja — for alleged abetment of suicide, destruction of evidence, discrimination and ragging has not begun.

The case has remained stalled for nearly a year after the state government removed the special public prosecutor days after the trial court added the then head of the gynaecology department as an accused for allegedly overlooking the harassment complaint. The Bombay High Court stayed the trial, and both the department head’s appeal and the state’s decision to remove the prosecutor remain pending.

Meanwhile, the accused were released on bail in August 2019 after over two months in jail, allowed to continue their postgraduate studies at the same medical college, and had their medical licence restored. Discharge applications filed by them denying all allegations including caste-based harassment are yet to be decided.

Abeda says promises of compensation and a job for Payal’s brother, who has a physical disability, were not fulfilled, either. “It feels like their lives have moved on but we are still struggling to be heard,” she said.