By Maktoob
Academic freedom in India is “severely restricted” amid increased government involvement in higher education and restrictions on academic expression, student protests and campus events, including the suspension of a professor over an exam question on “atrocities against Muslim minorities in India” and the banning of books on Kashmir’s sociopolitical history, according to the “Free to Think 2026” report.
The report, published by Scholars at Risk (SAR), an international network that monitors attacks on higher education, documented 382 attacks on higher education communities across 59 countries and territories between July 1, 2025, and June 30, 2026, and examined instances of violence, government interference and other measures that SAR said threatened academic freedom and university autonomy.
India was placed in the report’s “severely restricted” category alongside Hong Kong, Indonesia, Pakistan, the West Bank and Ukraine.
The report said the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government continued to use the University Grants Commission (UGC) as a “primary vehicle for state influence” over higher education.
It pointed to policy changes concerning the appointment of university vice-chancellors and the removal of the 10 per cent cap on non-permanent faculty as measures that have raised concerns over government influence and the increasing casualisation of academic labour.
Data from the Academic Freedom Index cited in the report showed India’s score falling from 0.38 in 2022 to 0.14 in 2025.
The report also documented government actions affecting research, teaching and publication. On March 11, 2026, the Supreme Court of India imposed what SAR described as a “life ban” on three academics from receiving public funding for curriculum development after their work on an NCERT social science textbook. The court objected to a reference to “corruption in the judiciary”, saying it could “[project] a negative image” of the institution, and the textbook was banned.
The court later modified its position in May 2026, allowing public universities and state governments to decide whether the academics could participate in future curricular work.
This story was originally published in maktoobmedia.com. Read the full story here.