Kolkata, April 13
The faculty of the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta, today moved the Supreme Court praying for an order impleading it as a respondent in the fee cut case already pending before the apex court.The move by the Faculty Council of the IIM-C came a week after the Chairman of the Board of Governors, Mr Y.C. Deveshwar, decided to accept the government order to slash fees from Rs 1.25 lakh to Rs 35,000.
The faculty, which had expressed its opposition to the Chairman’s decision, decided to make the application before the apex court independent of those which may be made by the board, the council said in a written statement here.
“The faculty feels that some members of the Board of Governors may not be exercising their independent judgement in the interest of the institute. It has, therefore, become incumbent upon the faculty to take up the interest of the institute, its faculty and its current and future students,” the council said.
Terming the government order, “illegal” and, “an attempt by the (HRD) ministry to encroach upon the autonomy of the institutes,” the faculty not only challenged the legality of the board meeting on March 26, in which the fee cut issue was discussed but questioned the claim of Mr Deveshwar that he had been authorised by the board to take a decision in this regard.
Meanwhile, the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad, in its first-ever response to the Supreme Court notice on the fee-cut issue, has put up a defiant stand against the HRD Ministry’s decision, alleging that it is aimed at encroaching upon the institute’s autonomy.
In an affidavit filed in the apex court registry today, the IIM claimed that the ministry’s decision was violative of the time-tested process of fixing the admission fee by its Board of Governors.
The affidavit said that the IIM would continue to collect Rs 1.58 crore annual fee from its students till a decision by the apex court.
The institute at the same time also submitted that its board was discussing the issue with the HRD Ministry, which had reduced the annual fee per student from Rs 1.50 lakh to Rs 30,000.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear on April 16 a public-interest litigation challenging the government’s decision. The court had issued notices to all six IIMs on an application by the petitioners seeking they be made party in the case.
