Impractical to levy low fee for medical courses, private institutions tell HC – Times of India

They were opposing a February 3 office memorandum issued by the union government’s National Medical Commission (NMC) insisting that the fee for 50% of seats in these institutions must be on a par with the fee collected by the government medical colleges in the respective state.

It takes anywhere between Rs 15 to 20 lakh per year to study MBBS in a self-financing college and Rs 25 to Rs 30 lakhs in a deemed to be university. The Tamil Nadu government itself has stated that it costs Rs 30 lakh per year, but it collects only Rs 18,000, senior advocate Vijay Narayan, representing the institutions, said.
“If private colleges are forced to collect only Rs 18,000 a year for 50% of seats, then they will have to collect Rs 50 to Rs 60 lakhs per year for the remaining 50% of the seats,” he added.

“If an institution invests huge money to provide state-of-the-art facilities, then it has to cover the costs by collecting appropriate fees from the students,” he said.

Pointing out the bond system adopted by the state-run medical colleges, he said, “it is only because of the highly subsidised medical education provided to students of government colleges, the state takes bonds from such students and makes sure that they serve the state for 2 years.

There is a fee fixation committee in the state. Private educational institutions are entitled to propose the fees based on the infrastructure they provide, Vijay Narayan said.

Recording the submission, the first bench of Chief Justice Munishwar Nath Bhandari and Justice N Mala adjourned the hearing to August 16.

According to the petitioners, through the memorandum they have been informed that the NMC has decided that the fee of the 50% seats in the private medical colleges and deemed universities should be on a par with the fee in the government medical colleges of that particular state or union territory.

The benefit of this fee structure would be first made available to those candidates who have availed government quota seats but limited to the extent of 50% of total sanctioned strength, they said.

“However, if the government quota seats are less than 50% of the total sanctioned seats of the respective medical college/deemed university, the remaining candidates would avail the benefit of fee equivalent to the government medical college fees based purely on the merit,” the memorandum said.