Views differ on IIMs' position on fee cuts

Though the Ministry of Human Resources Development's legal counsel reportedly claimed before the Bench of Supreme Court on Thursday during the hearing of the Public Interest Litigation (PIL) that five of the six Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) had agreed to implement its fee cut order, the reality is far from the statement of the Ministry even as IIM-Bangalore which was slated to come out with its resolution today, has decided to delay till early next week.

The legal counsel appearing for the Ministry told the Court that as most of the IIMs have decided to abide by its February 5 order, the petition should be dismissed while IIM-Ahmedabad has decided to talk to the government to sort out its issues.

The reality is: while IIM-Bangalore stakeholders had made its Chairman of the Board of Governors, S N Dutta responsible to come out with a resolution in the fee-cut and autonomy issue which shows that the Institute is yet finalise its position in the case, IIM-Indore Board meet resolved with the decision of abiding by the Supreme Court order only in the fee cut issue and the PIL is still being heard before the Court and the Bench has not yet come out with any decision in the fee cut issue.

"Rather the Court observed on Thursday that fee cut and autonomy issues are to be handled separately," said a legal expert. It may be recalled here that only during last week, Ministry officials distributed a letter signed by the former Director of IIM-I, S Sudarshanam in which the content was that the Institute has agreed to implement Ministry's fee cut order while other members of the Board including faculty representatives denied any such resolution taken on its Board meeting.

The new Director of IIM-I, P Parashar is yet to come out with his statements in this issue while he has taken charge only three days back on April 5, after Sudarshanam, an employee of the Ministry was recalled.

Even the decision has not been finalised in the IIM-Calcutta in which though the Chairman of the Board, Y C Deveshwar has come out with a resolution agreeing to implement the Ministry's fee cut order, the entire faculty strength of the Institute has started opining otherwise, strictly contradicting the resolutions taken by its Board Chairman.

The Faculty Council of the IIM-C also has come out with a stern resolution on Wednesday criticising the Chairman and resolutions. As the Faculty Council is one of the vital stakeholders of the organisation and it disagrees with its Chairman's views on the issue, faculty members of IIM-C have now raised a demand of revising the resolution.

"We do not agree with the resolution taken by the Chairman as we want to be bold enough and on the line of the resolutions of IIM-A," said a senior faculty members of IIM-C.

However, two other IIMs, IIM-Lucknow and IIM-Kozikode have finalised their resolutions and agreed to implement the Ministry's fee cut order which goes in favour of the Ministry.

Even IIM-B's resolution is being speculated to be on the line of IIM-A resolution and things will be pretty clear by next week when the resolution is expected to out after a delay from the schedule of coming out on Thursday.