Students protest,PU committee to look into fee hike

Terming the fee hike as ‘indiscriminate’,the students demanded a complete roll back of the fee hike and raised slogans against the university authorities.

“No circular was issued to make any clarification about the fee increased in most courses. University is a welfare institution. Such a hike will only lead to privatisation of education,” said SFS leader,Ramanpreet Singh. “The fee of some of courses has increased by Rs 20,000,” he added.

Elaborating on the issue,a PU official said,“The decision was taken by the Syndicate after the current academic session had begun. Since the prospectus had already been published,the increased fee amount was not collected along with the fee of the first semester. The increased fee is now being collected along with the second semester fee. This has become a high amount for some of the professional courses and so the students are complaining.”

The university has formed a committee of four Syndicate members to address the matter. The committee consisting of Dean College Development Council (DCDC) Professor Naval Kishore,Dean Student Welfare (DSW-Women) Professor Nandita Singh,Professor Shelly Walia and Professor Keshav Malhotra,is slated to meet on Monday to discuss the matter. The committee is expected to move the matter back to the Syndicate.

Not satisfied with the response from the authorities,the students have decided to continue their agitation till the issue is resolved.

Members of the Student Federation of India (SFI) have also extended support to the protesting students.