Telangana almost doubles PG medical fees in private colleges, draws criticism

Nirupa.Vatyam@timesgroup.com

Hyderabad:  05.05.2020

The Telangana government on Monday almost doubled the fees of postgraduate medical courses in private colleges to ₹7 lakh per annum from ₹3.8 lakh a year, inviting sharp criticism from doctors.

The April 14 dated GO on fee fixation was made public on Monday, two days before the web counselling for the 2020-2023 block period begins for some 600 plus seats across Telangana.

The fee was fixed based on the recommendations of the Telangana Admissions and Fee Regulatory Committee and will be applicable to all private unaided non-minority and minority postgraduate medical/ dental professional institutes in the state, the GO said.

For convenor quota seats (category A), two colleges--Chalmeda Anandrao Institute of Medical Sciences and Deccan College of Medical Sciences, will be allowed to charge ₹7.75 lakh per annum for clinical degree courses.

Likewise, the tuition fee of seven other colleges was fixed at ₹7.5 lakh and for five colleges at ₹7 lakh per annum. For dental courses, the highest fee was fixed at ₹6 lakh per annum.

Apart from raising the fee, the state has also directed colleges to seek a bank guarantee.

“The managements of the institution may seek bank guarantee for tuition fee chargeable for the next academic year,” reads the GO.

The members of the Telangana Junior Doctors Association(TJUDA) criticised the state for doubling fee, and called the move anti-student.

“This is just a strange decision by the government of Telangana, favouring private medical colleges,” said P S Vijayender of TJUDA. “The state is slowly taking medical education away from middle-class students,” he said.

Commenting on the state’s decision to allow institutes to seek bank guarantee, they questioned how middleclass people will be able to show ₹14 lakh balance as a guarantee after paying ₹7 lakh as first-year tuition fee.

JUDA members said this move will force many students to think twice before choosing private colleges, and added that with hardly two days left to select web options, they can’t even seek judicial help and get a stay on fee hike.

In the state, there are about 1400 PG medical seats, of which nearly half of them are in private colleges.

The members of the Telangana Junior Doctors Association (TJUDA) criticised the state for doubling fee, and called the move anti-student