On Sunday, Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank,’ the Union Human Resource Development (HRD) while speaking to the media, stated that due to ongoing lockdown which has been enforced due to COVID -19 pandemic, the Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs) along with Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) would not be increasing the tuition fees for the upcoming academic year, 2020- 21.
The Minister said that a meeting was held with the Directors of IIITs and Chairman, Standing Committee- IIT council. After consulting them, the Ministry concluded that the premier institutes will not increase the tuition fees for the upcoming academic year of 2020- 21 for any of the UG, PG or research courses offered by them.
Earlier, the officials from IIT Delhi had announced that the institute will not hike the fees of PG courses offered by it. With this announcement, the 23 IITs will now follow the same fee structure for both PG and UG courses for the 2019-20 academic calendar. An official statement released by the HRD Ministry said that they have this view that these institutes should take decisions that will benefit the enrolled students on a larger scale.
The IIT council headed by the HRD Minister is responsible for taking any decision regarding the fees of UG courses offered by them. For PG courses such as MBA or MTech, the IITs are free to take decisions individually. For the majority of the courses, the council takes decisions related to fee structure before the academic session commences in the month of June- July.
The HRD Minister further stated that he had requested IIITs not to increase the fees of other courses as well. They will also not be implementing a further 10% increase hike in tuition fees for the UG courses. The IIITs are Centrally funded Institutes (CFIs) which are also known as triple ITs.
Similarly, the ministry has also requested those IIITs which are currently running on the mode of public- private partnership (PPP) that for any of their UG, PG or the research courses of the upcoming academic year, the institutes should not be increasing their fees.
The IIITs consist of a Coordination Forum which is an apex body that issues directions and deciding policies for 20 similar institutes that were issued by the Government of India under PPP model. For the Centrally funded IIITs, the Council of IIITs takes decisions separately.