MES Medical College, Perinthalmanna, expelled a group of first year MBBS students from its online class on Thursday for delay in payment of next year’s tuition fee.
Over a dozen students were removed from the anatomy session, and they were denied attendance as well. The students said they had lost Thursday’s class examination too.
They said they faced the wrath of the college authorities as they could not pay fee in time. While a couple of students could not make the payment as they were held up in containment zones, a few NRI students had not paid the special fee.
Sheela Sivan, head of the department of anatomy, said the students were expelled for a day. “We have rectified it. We have added them back,” she added.
MES Medical College dean Girish Raj did not respond to telephone calls from this paper. However, Dr. Raj reportedly told some parents who contacted him that he was involved “only in academic matters”.
College administrator Hameed Fazal said some students might have been warned for failure to pay fee. “Unlike other institutions, we run the medical college only with fee collected from students. It is from the fee that we give subsidised treatment to patients,” he added.
However, Dr. Fazal said none would be expelled for delaying fee payment. “We would definitely consider the cases individually. We are willing to allow some cases to pay in part, and also at a specific date later. Such persons should contact us individually. We cannot afford fees delay by a large group,” he said.