Govt wakes up to smell the stink, orders a probe

‘‘The departments concerned have been directed to look into allegations made in the newspaper reports and conduct a probe,’’ Deputy Chief Minister Chhagan Bhujbal told reporters after the weekly cabinet meeting.

The Indian Express ran detailed accounts of how principals and other officials freely subverted a Supreme Court judgment that warned private medical and engineering colleges from ‘‘profiteering’’ on admissions. New Delhi Television 24 X 7 broadcast the tapes today.

Bhujbal said ministers and secretaries of the technical education and medical education will decide the nature of inquiry.

‘‘The departments will check whether there is any truth into the allegations and what laws have been violated by the colleges and then decide the course of action to be taken against them,’’ he said.

As the government squirmed—two of its ministers run two of the colleges named in the expose—Bhujbal made it clear that the colleges need to get their fee structure approved from regulatory authorities set up by the government for higher and medical education.

Significantly, technical education minister Dilip Valse-Patil said that management-quota admissions in private colleges should also be done on the basis of merit. ‘‘Even for the management quota, the department has prescribed that the colleges will have to invite applications, follow a transparent procedure and admit the students on the basis of merit,’’ he told this paper.

None of that is followed by most of Maharashtra’s 137 private engineering colleges and 17 private medical colleges.

Further, the minister also made it clear that the colleges must get their management quota fee approved by the Educational Institutions Regulatory Authority (EIRA).

Medical education secretary G S Gill said his department has taken ‘‘serious cognisance’’ of the expose. Medical colleges named in the report would be asked why they went ahead with the admissions even for the management quota, when the department had thrice asked them to wait till a policy was being formulated.

‘‘On sheer moral grounds, it should not have been done,’’ Gill said. ‘‘The honourable High Court is yet to decide on the status of the regulatory authority.’’

The Bombay High Court will hear a petition filed by colleges against regulation of their fees on Thursday.

Meanwhile, a highly placed source in a regulatory authority told The Indian Express that colleges found guilty of charging more than a ‘‘just surplus’’ for management-quota seats (see accompanying story) could be liable for action under the Maharashtra Educational Institutions (Prohibition of Capitation Fee) Act, 1987. That includes imprisonment for college officials.