HYDERABAD: Fee hike by private medical colleges for Super Speciality PG courses from Rs 5.85 lakh to Rs 25 lakh after the Health, Medical and Family Welfare Department (HM&WF) issued a GO (MS No 78) endorsing the hike has left aspirants in a tizzy.
The decision, however, was taken unilaterally by the department without consultation with the Telangana State Admissions and Fee Regulatory Committee, as is the protocol. Another bizarre aspect in this is that the said GO is not available on the official website and when members of Healthcare Reforms Doctors Association (HRDA) asked the authorities concerned for a physical copy of the GO, they were told it could not be handed over for confidentiality reasons.
“Colleges like Deccan College of Medical Sciences and Chalmeda Anand Rao Institute of Medical Sciences have already uploaded their fee as `25 lakh in MCC counselling website. In addition, they are also not making a distinction between the management and convenor quota,” said Dr K Mahesh Kumar, president, HRDA. While the fee for seats under convenor quota is `3.75 lakh, last year all the students were made to shell out `7.50 lakh, which is the fee for seats under Management quota.
“No one contested it last year. But this year they cannot afford `25 lakh. The latest GO is being used to blanket even convenor seats as management. Also, issuing the GO without consulting the TAFRC is illegal and unconstitutional,” said Dr G Srinivas, general secretary, HRDA.
Harried students who secured seats on merit basis are now contemplating not to take admission in Telangana colleges and instead look for colleges in other States. The association has also submitted a representation to Shanta Kumari, principal secretary HM&HW to repeal the GO and notify convenor and management quota seats separately for the ongoing counselling.
Dr B Karunakar Reddy, Vice Chancellor, KNRUHS, said: “KNRUHS has no role in the issue. AP had increased the fee last year so this year, on representation of private colleges of Telangana, the government must have increased fee for them too. But, of the 150 seats in Super Speciality in PG, only 15 are in private colleges. So, the impact is not going to be much. Fee of government colleges is not affected.”
What the GO says
As per request of the private unaided minority and non-minority colleges in Telangana for fee hike for Super Speciality PG courses, the government has revised the tuition fee in view of the “increased cost involved in imparting quality education escalation in costs and increase in university-related fees..” The fee hike has been only for courses under management quota but in the absence of separate counselling notifications for both quotas, colleges are not making any distinction