The Academic Council of Mangalore University in its meeting on Tuesday agreed to hike the sports fee for government college students in its jurisdiction from 2019-20.
In reality, an undergraduate student and a postgraduate student each will have to pay ₹190 more from the next academic year when compared to the fee paid by them in the current academic year.
Accordingly, an undergraduate student will have to pay ₹520 per year and a postgraduate student ₹580 per year. In that, the respective colleges will retain half of the fee amount for their sports activities and credit the remaining half to the university.
Kishore Kumar C.K., co-ordinator, Department of Physical Education, told the meeting that different colleges under the university organised 45 to 48 inter-collegiate sports meets every year.
The sports budget of each government college stood between ₹20,000 and ₹25,000 per annum.
With this amount the colleges are able to allow its students to participate in only five to seven inter-collegiate sports meets.
Hence, they are facing financial crunch to allow their students to participate in more sports meets.
When the fee is hiked the colleges can spend more amount for their own students to participate in more meets as they can keep half of the total fee. They will have to bear the cost of uniform, food, travel of sports students.
The government college representatives in the council did not have any objection to it stating that it will not be a huge burden on the students. Poor students from Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and other backward caste categories and girl students have enjoyed fee concession in government colleges. Hence it will not be a major issue, they said. Then the council agreed to the proposal.
The council resolved to hike the reservation in admission for persons with disabilities in higher education institutes under the university from 3% to 5%. In addition, it decided to relax the age limit for admission by five years.
