KOCHI: Even as the new fees ‘provisionally’ fixed by the Justice R. Rajendra Babu-led Fee Regulatory Committee for self-financing MBBS has caused heartburn among several parents and students, Justice K.T. Thomas who led the first fee regulatory committee in the state in 2002-03 says that he did not fix fee provisionally during his term.
“I did not fix fee provisionally. The first fee fixed for the management seat was Rs 1.30 lakh and I arrived at it after assessing the income and expenditure of the medical colleges and their attached hospitals. In fact I initially asked the medical colleges to submit their income-expenditure details, but they did not co-operate,” Justice K.T. Thomas told this newspaper on Thursday.
He also said that following this, he identified the different heads of accounting with the help of the government representatives in the fee regulatory committee who also opined that the income from hospitals also should be taken into account. “They arrived at an income of Rs 300 per bed at that time and the committee finally fixed it at Rs 200. The committee also verified the method adopted by the Vellore Christian Medical College in fixing their fee. The report in this regard went into 35 pages which was later approved by the Supreme Court while the reports in this regard from other states were rejected by the SC,” recalled Justice K T Thomas.
He, however, added that both the student outfits and managements found it not satisfactory to them at that time. Justice Thomas also said that he is not aware of the nittie-gritties of the self-financing medical education sector currently and hence is not in a position to comment on the new fees fixed by the Justice Rajendra Babu Committee.
