A protest by students of Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University has forced the Delhi government to rollback a fee hike on Sunday.
Students of various colleges protested outside Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s residence on Sunday, demanding that the fee hike order be withdrawn. Soon, Kejriwal announced in a tweet that he will ensure that the fee is not hiked.
“Learnt that fees of all IP Univ colleges have been hiked. Students agitated. My dear students, pl don’t worry. I hv asked Edu dept to roll it back. Study well. Best wishes 4 ur exams,” (sic) Kejriwal wrote on Twitter.
The students had held a similar protest outside the IP University on Friday.
“The 18 colleges affiliated to the university has already put up the notification for the proposed hike from the retrospective effect,” said Saket Bahuguna, ABVP national media convenor, who led the protest on Friday.
The fees had been hiked by a maximum of 24% among various colleges of the university.
A notification was issued last month by Director (Higher Education), Shiv Kumar, about the proposed fee hike based on the recommendation of the state fee regulatory committee set up by the Delhi government on February 1, 2013.
However, the university said that the order was yet to be notified and colleges and institutions could hike the fee only after the notification.
“…University is in the process of notifying the fee revised structure so that the same can be implemented in a uniform manner and meanwhile no college should initiate any action for charging of enhanced fee,” said the university in a statement.
There are about 106 privately-owned colleges/institutions affiliated to the IP University.