Jamia faces students' ire over fee hike; to reconsider move

Jamia Millia Islamia's plan to increase fee in all its courses by five per cent from upcoming academic session has met with protests from students following which the varsity has decided to reconsider the move.
While students have threatened to go on a hunger strike arguing that the varsity had increased the fee by 10 per cent in all courses last year and the new hike will come as a setback to those from poor economic background, the varsity authorities maintained that it is a "nominal" increase.
"Initially two students will go on hunger strike in protest against the hike. The university has made it a pattern to increase the fee every year. A large section of the university students come from poor background where even affording the existing fee is difficult," a Jamia student said on condition of anonymity.

Another student said "the university says just the tuition fee has been hiked but does that make it any affordable. We are studying in a centrally-funded university which is a minority institution too still students are being made to cough up more money."
Amid protest from students, the university has formed a six-member panel, including two student representatives, to look into the issue.
"It is a marginal hike as we have instructions from the HRD ministry that universities are expected to mobilise their resources internally. The hike in tuition fee will not add more than Rs 5-6 lakh in our corpus annually," Jamia spokesperson Mukesh Ranjan said.

"However, keeping the concerns raised by students in mind, the university has constituted a six-member committee which will also have two student representatives. The panel will reconsider the move and come up with its suggestion," he said.