Hyderabad: Scores of students who have applied for fee reimbursement and post-matric scholarships are in a quandary due to the delay by the state government in reimbursing the fees and paying out the scholarship money.
As many as 13 lakh students applied for fee reimbursement and scholarships for the academic year 2017-18 across Telangana.
Another 13 lakh students have applied for the 2018-19 academic year.
The state government has paid Rs 1,057 crore for the academic year 2017-18 and is in arrears of Rs 1,240 crore.
Student organisations are up in arms about the delay in payment.
Sharan Raichur, president of the Telangana Engineering College Students Joint Action Committee, said that many students have had to leave their colleges and return to their native places as private colleges refuse to allow them into the classes until their fees are paid.
He said that private managements are insisting that students pay the fee themselves and whenever the government releases the money the amount will be refunded to the students.
A majority of the students depending on fee reimbursement are from rural backgrounds and cannot afford to pay their own fees, which vary from college to college. The government reimburses only Rs 35,000.
Mr Raichur said students from Backward Class and Economically Backward communities are facing real hardship.
Ravi Siva Ramakrishna, general secretary of the All India Students’ Federation, Telangana state unit, points out that college managements are retaining the certificates and marks memos of engineering students who have completed their engineering course until the fees are reimbursed to them.
He said the Supreme Court and the Hyderabad High Court had ordered that colleges have no power to retain the original certificates of students who have completed their studies, but many colleges are not honouring the court orders, and are also ignoring letters issued by the State Higher Education Council for the release of the certificates.
He said that three lakh students are roaming around the colleges in pursuit of their certificates as they cannot apply for further education or jobs without the certificates.
Mr Ramakrishna said that every year around Rs 2,500 crore is required for the post-matric scholarships and the fee reimbursement, with the former amounting to around Rs 1,400 crore.
Authorities in the higher education department say they are processing all the applications and forwarding them to the Treasury department. They can release the funds only when the state government gives clearance.
