College hiked fees: Mithibai students

COLLEGE PRINCIPAL RAJPAL HANDE AND SVKM CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER ASOKE BASAK DID NOT RESPOND TO HT’S CALLS, TEXTS

Students of Vile Parle’s Mithibai College have complained that the college has imposed a fee hike amid the Covid-19 outbreak.

Despite repeated attempts, college principal Rajpal Hande and Shri Vile Parle Kelavani Mandal’s (SVKM) chief executive officer Asoke Basak did not respond to HT calls and messages.

On Thursday, the autonomous college began the in-house admission process of students pursuing their second and third-year Arts, Science, Commerce, Banking and Insurance, Management Studies, Mass Media, Finance Management, Accountancy and Finance, Computer Science, Biotechnology and Biochemistry courses. Students are supposed to pay their fee online by Tuesday. However, many students claimed that the fees have been increased substantially, despite the University of Mumbai (MU) as well as the University Grants Commission (UGC) directing institutes against a hike. “For the BSC course, the fee was ₹30,000 last year, which is hiked to ₹40,000 this year,” said a third-year student.

MUMBAI :

Another student from the Arts faculty said that the fee had increased from ₹36,000 to ₹60,000.

“The college didn’t even allow the instalment option. All our efforts to reach the administration have not yielded any result,” said the student.

In view of the lockdown , UGC – the apex body governing all educational institutes in the country – issued a letter on May 27 to all universities and colleges asking them to be considerate towards students while asking them to pay tuition and other fees. Subsequently, on Monday, MU also instructed all colleges to not hike fees for academic year 2020-21 and allow students to pay fees in instalments. Vinod Patil, officiating registrar of MU, said , “All colleges, including autonomous ones, have to follow the guidelines set by the university as well as the UGC.”