Telangana State links arrears to FAST scheme

 

An undertaking will be given to engineering colleges that the state will pay the beneficiary students’ fees later with the rider that the colleges will be paid their fee reimbursement dues only if they accept the undertaking. The five-member committee formed to devise the eligibility criteria for FAST met on Tuesday and even invited engineering colleges, apparently to know their opinion on implementation of the scheme.

 

The TS government owes the college managements about Rs1300 crore, which the latter have been claiming unsuccessfully for long. Now the government has offered to bail them out in return of their “cooperation”. “We are asking the colleges to cooperate with us to implement the scheme. But there is no assurance that fee reimbursement arrears will be paid on such and such date,”  a senior government official said.

 

A member of the delegation of colleges that met the committee elaborated, “They said they would release the arrears before the first counselling. And we will have to accept an undertaking that we will not collect fees from FAST-eligible students at the time of admission.” The member further said, “They said they would finalise the FAST criteria by the second counselling and beneficiaries would also know if they were eligible and if not, opt out. Other candidates can then claim the vacated seat.”

 

 

Thus, only the colleges that accept the undertaking will be paid the pending arrears. In normal circumstances, fee reimbursement beneficiaries would have to produce certificates of income and caste to claim the benefits of the scheme. But this time, since there is no time and with the FAST criteria yet to be released, students will have to produce the required certificates later.