UGC to offer over 23,000 higher education courses for free on its new portal.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) announced on Thursday that more than 23,000 higher education courses, including programs in artificial intelligence, cyber security, and early childhood care, will now be free to access on a new web portal.

As part of the National Education Policy-2020’s second anniversary celebration, the portal will be launched on Friday. The aim of the new portal is to bridge the digital divide and enhance accessibility of higher education in remote parts of the country.

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“As part of its efforts in making higher education accessible to all, the UGC has been constantly working on making digital resources available to students in English as well as regional languages,” UGC chairman M Jagadesh Kumar said.There are 23,000 postgraduate courses, in addition to 25 non-engineering SWAYAM courses and 137 SWAYAM MOOC courses in emerging fields. Accessing these through the UGC portal is free of charge.

“All courses are free. However, to avail of the services and infrastructure of CSC/ SVP, a user has to pay a fee of Rs 20 per day or Rs 500 per month to reimburse the VLEs’ efforts and the cost of their infrastructure, “said Mr. Kumar.