Telangana: Fee hike for professional courses unlikely this year

Hyderabad: A fee hike for professional courses including engineering, pharmacy, law and BEd is unlikely to happen for the academic year 2022-23. The Telangana Admission and Fee Regulatory Committee (TAFRC) which met on Monday discussed various fee aspects including continuation of the existing fee structure this year.

The fee for professional courses is revised every three years and the last such revision was in 2019, and in effect till 2021-22. The revision was due for the next three-year block period i.e., 2022-23 to 2024-25.

However, given the Covid-19 pandemic which financially hit parents, the committee discussed continuation of the existing fee structure for this year. A 10 per cent fee hike on the existing fee for all courses or fixing the fee based on details from colleges was also discussed. “A decision is expected on Wednesday,” an official said.

Earlier, the TAFRC called for applications from professional colleges to revise the fee for the three-year block period from 2022-23 to 2024-25.

Accordingly, a fee for 175 engineering colleges was fixed with the CBIT receiving the highest fee of Rs.1.73 lakh per annum, while the minimum was Rs.45,000 per annum. Some colleges, particularly in rural areas, have asked for the fee to be fixed at Rs.35,000 citing inability of students to pay more.

Meanwhile, TAFRC officials found discrepancies in audit reports furnished by several professional colleges. The audit reports submitted online, auditor’s report and by the college principal, according to officials, do not match.

“Some colleges came for review on the fixed fee. While going through the reports, there were several discrepancies in the reports. We randomly picked reports submitted by 15 colleges and all had discrepancies,” an official said.