Notice to State, fee regulatory panel

The R L Jalappa Institute of  Technology has filed a petition seeking the revelation and implementation of Padmaraj Committee report on fee regulation for engineering courses.
Justice Padmaraj had been appointed in May 2010 as the Chairman of the Fee Regulatory Committee to determine the fee structure in professional engineering and medical colleges.

Fee determination

As per a 2005 Supreme Court judgment, the State government has to appoint a fee regulatory committee that would determine fees to be charged for a period of three years. But, the State will have to forego seats from private colleges for CET.

To overcome this, the government and private colleges have been entering into consensual agreement over the last few years, whereby certain percentage of seats will be allotted through CET, and the fee will be mutually determined.

The government had fixed the annual fees for engineering courses at Rs 30,000, but the private colleges have insisted on Rs 50,000.

Mandatory

However, a High Court judgment in November 2009 ruled that if the government accepts the fee regulatory committee’s report, colleges have to mandatorily abide by it, overriding any consensual agreement.

As the case is pending with the Supreme Court, the High Court had not spoken about the eventuality of the Government not accepting the report.

Meanwhile, the State government, along with private managements, has already approached the apex court challenging the High Court verdict.