At least 120 students selected for the post graduate courses in medical and dental disciplines have surrendered their seats as they are unable to pay the exorbitant fee fixed by the Karnataka High Court.
With the AB Murgod Committee seeking more time to finalise the fee structure for postgraduate medical and dental seats in all colleges, the Court issued a tentative fee structure for these fees, which had to be paid as soon as the candidates were selected after counselling.
The Court had asked the AB Murgod Committee to reach in a final fee structure within four weeks.
The Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGHUS) has taken a serious stand against some colleges refusing to admit students to post graduate medical and dental courses.
In its notification, RGHUS warned the errant colleges of action and asked them to admit students in the 50:50 ratio where the fee hike was applicable only to donation students and not to the merit candidates. The colleges were asked to send the list to students they had admitted by June 4 and relevant documents before June 30.
Meanwhile, the High Court directed five medical colleges not to discharge post graduate students who had been admitted under the reserved category for eight weeks on the ground of non-payment of fees.
The High Court also directed the State Government to make arrangements to pay the balance fees, payable to the colleges by the students in the form of scholarships to these students who got admitted to the PG courses under the government quota.
Justice KL Manjunath passed the interim order on the petitions filed by Dr. M Srinivas and four other MBBS graduates who said that they belonged to the Scheduled Caste (SC) category and were therefore eligible for reservation and fee concessions. They said they could not pay the fees, as it was too steep and unaffordable.
The petitioners were admitted to the PG courses in the five medical colleges under the government quota and they had paid only Rs 15,000 as specified by the government as fees at the time of admission. The petitioners further stated that the college managements has asked them to remove then from the college if they failed to pay the balance amount on May 28. The students stated that the college managements had forced them to sign undertakings in this regard.
The petitioners who got admission in the private colleges based on merit list further argued that they were entitled to get concession on fee to be paid and it was the duty of the State Government to pay the balance amount.
After hearing the petitioners, the High Court directed the principals of Father Muller's Medical College in Mangalore, Sri Siddhartha Medical College, Tumkur, MS Ramaiah Medical College, Bangalore and JM Medical College in Davengere not to remove the petitioner-students from the post graduate seats they had been allotted.