The Engineering College managements have questioned the online fee fixation system introduced by the Admissions and Fee Regulatory Committee (AFRC) and termed the whole process against the spirit of natural justice.
The Consortium of Engineering and Professional Colleges' Managements Association (CEPCMA) has decided to move the High Court terming the system as ‘highly defective’. The AFRC has recently issued guidelines for fee fixation for professional courses for a three-year block period from 2013-14 to 2015-16 and asked professional colleges to submit fee proposals online from February 1 to 20.
The CEPCMA Chairman, N. Ramesh; President Nova Krishna Rao; Working President R.Pradeep Reddy and other general secretaries K.V.K. Rao and K. Sunil Kumar said that an emergency meeting of the CEPCMA held on Sunday has demanded the AFRC to immediately revise norms for fixing the fee or else they would move the court.
Their contention is that the new system was devised to fix fees for next three academic years based on the income and expenditure statements of this academic year. Expenditure will rise due to inflation, enhanced salaries, academic initiatives and infrastructure. The process devised by the AFRC will reduce the fee structure even for best colleges leave alone middle level colleges. Fee will be less than Rs. 20,000 if the present system is followed, they claimed.
They also saw some ‘conspiracy’ in the exercise as the Government wants to reduce fee reimbursement burden on it. Such system will also lead to fall in education standards and colleges will not be able to survive with meagre fee, they said.
The CEPCMA also wanted the Government to release the balance 50 per cent fee reimbursement arrears before February 28 and also release the fee payment schedule for reimbursement scheme for 2013-14 academic year.
