HRD panel’s zero-fee advice buries facts: IIMA staff

Said one official, ‘‘In truth, we have been using all our income from training to make up the shortfall from charging students Rs 1.58 lakh yearly when we actually spend Rs 2.8 lakh per student per year.’’

He said none of the big three IIMs had received planned-expenditure grant from the government, even when a specific request was made. However, IIMC recently received a sanction of Rs 4 crore after its board chairman Y C Deveshwar — despite opposition from the faculty — signed a memorandum agreeing to accept the fee-cut. The faculty at IIMC, however, says it will not touch this amount until the fee-cut controversy is sorted out.

‘‘We had written to seek Rs 2.7 crore under planned budget for capital expenditure, but there was no response,’’ he said. ‘‘It is not that we cannot manage on our own, but the corpus fund is supposed to be used only for development enterprises, not for day-to-day expenses.’’

Other sources pointed out that the Shunglu committee report mirrors what joint secretary V.S. Pandey’s threat at the IIMA Society meeting on March 8.

Excerpts from the tape of that meeting, published by The Indian Express, had Pandey saying: ‘‘Why should you charge fees when even if you charge nothing from students you will end up with a surplus.’’

IIMA administrators said the institute had already dipped into the corpus fund for expanding its campus, and is meeting the shortfall of Rs 1.3 lakh per student per year by using up earnings from consultation.

The Shunglu committee report says the interest generated by the corpus fund should be enough to fuel the institutes. However, a senior official said, ‘‘In March 2003, we had Rs 98 crore in corpus fund, but we have used up a bit of it on the Rs 50-crore new campus project. The report says the Rs 7 crore interest generated yearly should be enough to meet the shortfall in tuition fees.’’

With 600 students in total, the total fee amount generated is around is Rs 10 crore, whereas the total cost is Rs 22.8 crore, which the interest from the corpus fund cannot meet.

Said Pankaj Chandra, professor of production and quantitative methods: ‘‘I would like to know what is the basis of these kind of conclusions as Shunglu has made. Liquidation of corpus for tuition fee is not sustainable. How can he even suggest that?’’

Meanwhile IIMB director Parakash Apte said, ‘‘The issue is serious. Now that we have also initiated a dialogue, I would like to have a look at the report before saying anything. We have formally asked for a copy of the report and it should reach us in a day or two.’’

As the controversy heats up before the next date of meeting between the core committee of IIMs and HRD ministery, Prof B.H. Jajoo, one member of the four member committee said, ‘‘Out of the tution fee of Rs 1.58 lakh, we spend only Rs 80,000 on tuition per se. The rest goes towards providing lodging and boarding, Internet connections, library, and other amenities.’’