A meeting on the proposed fee hike for professional courses between managements of private educational institutions and the Fee Regulatory Committee ended in a stalemate on Saturday. The meeting was held days after the committee capped the fee hike at 8%.
Representatives of deemed-to-be universities and private universities in the State met with committee chairman and former judge D.V. Shylendra Kumar to discuss the matter.
While the management of Sri Devaraj Urs Academy of Higher Education and Research submitted that they were guided by the UGC regulations and hence did not come under the purview of the committee set up in the State, representatives of at least two private universities said they were guided by their own Acts and had formed their own fee regulatory committees. Both the parties, urged the committee not to include them under the proposed 8% fee hike cap, as they were following a different set of regulations.
However, the committee stuck to its stand and said all the institutions in the State were under its ambit. “Even if they were accountable to other fee regulatory committees, that did not exempt them from the State-constituted committee,” the chairman said.
S. Kumar, Chancellor, Sri Devaraj Urs Academy of Higher Education and Research, told reporters that they had submitted their side of the argument and would wait for the committee’s response.
Recently, Mr. Shylendra Kumar had said the committee would penalise medical, dental, and engineering college managements if they hiked institutional quota fee by more than 8% of that in the previous academic year.