Colleges under University of Mumbai reopen, but still await clarity

Even as the University of Mumbai recently requested all affiliated colleges to start the new academic year online from June 14, colleges are awaiting clarity on certain issues, including fee payment

Even as the University of Mumbai recently requested all affiliated colleges to start the new academic year online from June 14, colleges are awaiting clarity on certain issues, including fee payment.

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“Last year, when the pandemic first hit India, several families felt financial strain and were worried about being unable to pay their children’s college fees. This year, too, the situation hasn’t changed, and several students and parents are expecting concessions or fee payment in instalments,” said Anju Kapoor, principal of UPG College, Vile Parle, adding the college is finding it difficult to accommodate all.

Last year, the university had requested colleges to cut down their original fee structure and make instalment facility available for students. This year, however, the MU has given no such intimation and colleges, too, feel it’ll be impossible to run the institute without full fees for another consecutive year. Many have decided to defer reopening of college by a week or two to accommodate students who are still to pay fees, so that no one misses lectures once the course commences. “In genuine cases, we are helping students in whatever way possible. In fact, nearly 25% of our batches across courses are yet to pay the fees, so we’ve decided to start skill-based lectures this week and wait for everyone to pay before starting regular lectures,” said Kapoor, adding the college hopes all students pay their fees by next week so lectures can commence for all batches at the same time next week,” she added.

Last week, a handful of students of a college in Malad approached the management for concessions in the annual fee, but the college didn’t budge.

“We will have to seek some documents from students to confirm their financial status. Last year, we allowed fee payment in instalments and some students had not paid their fee in full until March this year. How will we run our institute without the fees,” asked the principal of the college, on condition of anonymity.

Colleges are also still unclear about the admission criteria for first-year undergraduate degree courses, now that Class 12 exams across boards have been scrapped this year.

“Autonomous institutes have been demanding to be allowed to conduct admissions separately at their level. This way, we can start the process and complete it soon. However, there is no clarity from the university,” said Naresh Chandra, principal of BK Birla College, Kalyan.

MU registrar (in-charge) BN Gaikwad told HT that the university has not yet received any complaints about fees from colleges or Students. “We will, however, release guidelines for this soon,” he said.