AICTE Proposes New PhD Rules in Technical Education: 2.5 Years Duration, Mandatory Research Publication & AI Disclaimers

AICTE New PhD Rules: The  All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has announced some new rules regarding the PhD programme. The stricter norms are put in place by the AICTE. The AICTE has constituted a task force under the Chairmanship of Bangalore University’s former Vice-Chancellor, KR Venugopal. This taskforce has assigned the task to formulate new regulations and guidelines for PhD and DSc programmes in technical education.

AICTE New PhD Rules

The taskforce formulated by the AICTE has recommended the mandatory publishing of research work in peer-reviewed journals and to include the disclaimers regarding the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in theses. Till now, the AICTE has largely followed the UGC (University Grants Commission) guidelines for technical education. The taskforce has submitted its report to the AICTE in July 2025.

AICTE Rules and Regulations

The new rules and regulations formulated by the taskforce under Venugopal states that it is mandatory for the research scholars:

• To publish their articles as first and corresponding authors in peer-reviewed journals. These articles must be based on their thesis.

• The research scholars who have published their articles in the Scopus-indexed Q1 journals, can complete their thesis in as little as two and a half years.

While the UGC does not make it mandatory to publish the articles in the journals, Venugopal states that it is necessary for the scholars to publish their articles in the journals so that they can guide the next level students through the publication process. Also, he emphasized that the student must be the first author in the publication and not the guide.

AI Usage Guidelines

The taskforce has also mandated that the research fellow must also make it necessary to disclose the AI-content percentage in their publication through disclaimers, alongside copyright statements, proper referencing, and plagiarism checks. Venugopal stated that the use of 20% AI content is allowed.

The new rules will also allow the students to migrate between two universities during their course duration.

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