Government engineering colleges in Telangana are planning to approach the State Higher Education Council demanding a fee hike. The colleges say that the free structure has not been increased in the last 13 years, and claim that they haven’t been able to revamp their infrastructure due to this. This, they say, has hit their national rankings.
“To compete with the private colleges and improve our standard in NIRF (National Institutional Ranking Framework) rankings, we have to hike the fee. This is a necessary step. The curriculum, systems, and laboratories have to be upgraded as per present day requirement. So for that we have made an appeal with state education council,” said M Kumar, principal of University College of Engineering, Osmania University.
JNTU Hyderabad is also contemplating approaching the fee regulatory committee for the same, and even Kakatiya University is likely to follow the suit.
“In 2007, the fees were hiked. Since then, it has remained the same. So we want the fee to be hiked to Rs 35,000 from Rs 10,000. The students need not worry, those who are from marginalised backgrounds can avail scholarships,” Kumar said.
“Fees of private colleges are more than Rs 3 lakh per year, whereas we are taking only a nominal fee of Rs 10,000. Even schools are charging more nowadays,” he said.
The administration hopes that the fees will be regulated from the next academic year.
JNTU-H has however, said that they want the fees to be hiked only for self-financed courses in its constituent engineering colleges. JNTU-H has colleges in Hyderabad, Jagityal, Manthani and Sultanpur. For a Btech course in JNTU, the fee is Rs 10,000 and Rs 15,000 for Mtech course.
Speaking to TNM, JNTU-H Vice Chancellor A Venugopal Reddy said, “For several years, fees for the self-financed courses have remained the same. It has to be periodically revised. Presently, the fee is very nominal at Rs 10,000. We will approach the regulatory body soon and discuss about it.”
According to a report in Telangana Today, as many as 1070 private colleges including 170 engineering colleges in the state have applied to the Telangana Academic Fee Regulatory Committee seeking hike in fees. Last date for the submission of applications seeking fee revision is March 20.