M A I N   N E W S

IITs raise annual fee by 80%
Aditi Tandon/TNS

New Delhi, January 7
Students entering the IIT system from this academic session will have to pay 80 per cent more annual tuition fee than those currently enrolled in the premier technical institutes.

The IIT Council today granted its approval to hiking the annual tuition fee at the 16 institutes from the current Rs 50,000 to Rs 90,000. All undergraduates joining IITs from 2013 will have to pay the enhanced fee. The fee is applicable only prospectively and will not cover the existing batches.

Students from disadvantaged sections, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes will not be charged any fee and their education will continue to be subsidised by others who have the capacity to pay. Also, 25 per cent students in 16 IITs whose annual parental income is less than Rs 4.5 lakh a year will continue to get 100 per cent scholarships. SC and ST students already get free mess, free books and free hostel facility.

The decision was taken this evening by the IIT Council, the supreme policy-making body in respect of IITs, at a meeting chaired by HRD Minister MM Pallam Raju.

Defending the hike, Raju said it would not affect anyone adversely. The past evidence suggested that no JEE pass out had ever had to quit his course midway on account of inability to pay the fee, he added.

“The idea is to ensure that IITs are no longer dependent on non-plan funding and generate their own resources on the lines of IIMs. We do not want to make the IITs profitable, but we certainly want to make them financially sustainable. Today, barely 20 per cent of the entire budget of IITs comes from tuition fees and other earnings, while 80 pc comes from the government,” Raju said.

The last fee revision at IITs happened in 2007-2008 when it was revised from Rs 25,000 to Rs 50,000 annually. Former HRD Minister Kapil Sibal had set up a panel under former Atomic Energy Commission chairperson Anil Kakodkar to recommend fee hike. The committee suggested hiking tuition fee to Rs 2 to Rs 2.25 lakh per year which it calculated as the recurring cost the IITs bore on each student every year.

The steep hike was rejected and a downward revision worked upon leading to today’s decision that came after two years of deliberations.

Higher Education Secretary Ashok Thakur said fund crunch was a reality and the higher education sector was feeling the squeeze of resources in the 12th Plan. “IIT students who can afford to pay must pay,” he said.

COSTLY EDUCATION

• The annual tuition fee at the 16 IITs will go up from the current Rs 50,000 to Rs 90,000
• The decision will be applicable to all undergraduates joining IITs from 2013
• The fee is applicable only prospectively and will not cover the existing batches