What you need to know about Karnataka’s Rohith Vemula Bill

Subscribed with another email? Logout and Login with that one. Account subscription benefits alongside Premium Stories, Editorials, Opinions and more. Unlock these with Subscription The View From India Looking at World Affairs from the Indian perspective. First Day First Show News and reviews from the world of cinema and streaming. Today's Cache Your download of the top 5 technology stories of the day. Science For All The weekly newsletter from science writers takes the jargon out of science and puts the fun in! Data Point Decoding the headlines with facts, figures, and numbers THEdge At the cutting edge of education and careers Health Matters Ramya Kannan writes to you on getting to good health, and staying there Gender Agenda Stories from beyond the binary. The Hindu On Books Books of the week, reviews, excerpts, new titles and features. Updated - May 13, 2026 01:10 pm IST - Bengaluru Radhika Vemula, alongside a banner featuring her son Rohith Vemula who was a student of University of Hyderabad | Photo Credit: NAGARA GOPAL The Karnataka Rohith Vemula (Prevention of Discrimination, Exclusion or Injustice) (Right to Education and Dignity) Bill, 2026, received cabinet nod in April after months of deliberations and debates. The revised Bill aims to prevent exclusion and injustice while safeguarding the right to education and the dignity of students, teaching faculty, and non-teaching staff belonging to scheduled castes and scheduled tribes (SC/ST). It guarantees equal access to education in all higher educational institutions across Karnataka, including public, private, charitable institutions and deemed universities. Following the death of Rohith Vemula, a 26-year-old Dalit PhD scholar at the University of Hyderabad in 2016, political and civil society pressure has been building up for a dedicated anti-caste discrimination law in higher education. The Karnataka government started drafting the Bill, about a year ago in April 2025, after Rahul Gandhi wrote to the State, urging introduction of a Rohith Vemula Act. The idea was to come up with a framework covering preventive and remedial measures to address the issues of students and faculty from marginalised communities who continue to face caste discrimination on campuses. The draft Bill went through multiple iterations. During the Karnataka Budget 2026–27, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah formally announced the government’s intention to introduce the Rohith Vemula Bill. In April, the Bill got the nod from the State Cabinet. The Bill defines both caste-based harassment and discrimination, including direct and indirect discrimination. Caste-based harassment is defined as any hostile, abusive, or aggressive behaviour, whether verbal, non-verbal, spoken, written, recorded, visual, or digital, that humiliates or threatens the dignity of SC/ST individuals based on their caste. Discrimination is any intentional or unintentional act or omission that adversely affects those from SC/ST communities, including failure to treat them on par with others, preferential treatment towards those from castes considered ‘higher’ in the caste hierarchy, and other similar caste-based practices. An aggrieved person could be a student or a member of the faculty or staff from the SC/ST community at any higher educational institution, who allegedly faced discrimination and/or caste-based harassment. The Bill covers not just the spaces of work and residence within educational institutions, but also all the online and offline spaces where the students, faculty and staff fraternise with each other. These include hostels, health centres, sports grounds, staff quarters, parks, streets, canteens and transport facilities, among others. The Bill mandates that higher educational institutions shall be open to all individuals regardless of their sex, gender, race, caste, religion, sexuality or disability, and explicitly states that no individual belonging to SC/ST communities shall be subjected to discrimination or caste-based harassment. “It shall not be lawful for higher educational institutions to impose on any person any test whatsoever of religious belief or profession in order to entitle him to be admitted thereto as a teacher or a student or to hold any office therein or to graduate there from or to enjoy or exercise any privilege thereof as may be prescribed,” it notes. The Bill recognises the right of individuals from the SC/ST communities to overcome caste prejudice by organising collectively, forming associations, promoting anti-caste discussions through reading clubs, refusing to participate in events and activities that reinforce caste prejudice, and not being subjected to penalties or negative appraisals for asserting their views against caste, among others. It also endorses the right of community members to maintain confidentiality regarding their caste identity. One of the most elaborate sections of the Bill is the list of prohibited actions. It identifies 30

What you need to know about Karnataka’s Rohith Vemula Bill

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What you need to know about Karnataka’s Rohith Vemula Bill

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