Representative bodies of private technical institutions in the State have demanded a substantial hike in fees for courses before the National Fee Structure Committee appointed by the Central Government for rationalising the cost of technical education in the country.
The committee appointed by the Union Human Resource Development Ministry and headed by Justice BN Srikrishna was here on Sunday to seek views of the stakeholders for rationalisation of the fee structure for various disciplines of technical education.
The committee, which would recommend a model fee structure for the entire country aimed at reducing the fee gap between similar institutions, held discussions with senior officials of the Department of Employment, Technical Education and Training (ETET), the Odisha Private Engineering College Association (OPECA), the Odisha Private Engineering Schools’ Association (OPESA), the Odisha Management College Association (OMCA) and the Odisha Technical College Association (OTCA).
“A large number of MBA pass-outs from our State are getting jobs. The fee structure here is very less considering the infrastructure provided and the methodology adopted for such education,” said Prof GD Das on behalf of the OMCA. He suggested revision of the fee for MBA and PGDM courses to `4 lakh.
The OPECA, in its representation to the committee, said that currently the annual fees for engineering courses in the State vary from `40,000 to `80,000. Taking the present conditions of engineering colleges in the State into consideration, it is not possible to appoint quality teaching and nonteaching staff with this fee structure. The fees should be hiked to `60,000 to `1.20 lakh. This fee structure should be applicable for the first three years, the OPECA said.
It said colleges having NAAC and NBA accreditation should be allowed to collect additional fees of `5,000 to `10,000 and inform students six months in advance how much fees is to be collected for which year.
It complained that deemed universities are charging `2 lakh a year for undergraduate engineering courses while the State Government has allowed a maximum `63,000 to the best private colleges. “We have sought a level playing field before the panel,” said OPECA secretary Binod Dash.
Fees for diploma courses in the State have not been revised since 2010, said OPESA secretary Saroj Kumar Sahoo in the association’s representation. He said that in accordance with the 2010 fixation of fees, `26,500 is being collected as annual fee for diploma courses.
The committee told State Government officials that it would recommend fee structures for different technical courses after studying all the representations placed before it.