Thiruvananthapuram: The state government has expressed its willingness to revert to the multi-tier fee structure for medical colleges like last year. This was made clear by health minister K.K. Shylaja while responding to the proposal of eight self-financing medical college managements, who expressed their willingness to reduce the fee for 50 per cent government quota to last year’s level. The government had come under strident criticism from various quarters, including Left student’s organisations, over the steep hike in fee for government quota seats in self-financing colleges.
The SF colleges have asked the government to allow a hike in the fee for NRI and management quota fee to set off the huge deficit. The fee for MBBS course at private self-financing medical colleges in the state for both government quota and management quota was provisionally fixed at Rs 5.5 lakh for the current academic year by the fee regulatory committee, headed by Justice R. Rajendra Babu. However, these colleges have been allowed to collect Rs 20 lakh from 15 percent NRI quota admissions. Kerala Private Medical College Management Association secretary Anilkumar Vallil told Deccan Chronicle that proposal was for scholarships for the students admitted to government quota. For that we have asked the government to increase the fee structure for management and NRI quota. The volume of increase in the fee for management quota and NRI quota was not decided. It would be decided through discussions with the government, Mr Vallil said.
Last year, the fee structure was as follows: Rs 25,000 was the fee fixed for 20 seats in BPL and SEBC seats. For remaining 30 seats in government quota, the fee was Rs 2.5 lakh. The fee for 35 seats in management quota fee was Rs 11 lakh and 15 seats in NRI quota Rs 15 lakh. Meanwhile, Ms Shyalaja said that the report that Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had expressed displeasure over the discrepancies in the Kerala Medical Education (Regulation and Control of Admission to Medical Educational Institutions) Ordinance 2017 was not true. There were certain clerical errors in the ordinance. The cabinet reissued it correcting the minor errors. The new fee regulatory committee as per the provisions of the ordinance would be constituted soon, Ms Shylaja said.
