Anantapur: Allegations of funds mismanagement have been made against the seven-decades-old SSBN College here. Students accused the college of diversion of fee reimbursement funds to other accounts, instead of giving the money back to them.
Student unions said the fees reimbursement amount of Rs 43.39 lakh for the academic years 2010-2014 and 2017-18 was diverted by the college trust to other accounts without paying the money back to students and remittance of the remaining amount to the government.
AISF district unit president Kullayi Swamy and secretary Chiranjeevi said the college management was indulging in large-scale of irregularities. "Cases have been registered against five members of the management at two-town police station in connection with the illegal diversion of the fee reimbursement funds," union leaders said and demanded the arrest of the guilty.
The students were on a protest for the past few days against large-scale irregularities in the college and they demanded government take-over of the institution and its running through the higher education department instead of the present managing committee.
The controversial amendment of the college trust by-laws led to legal complications after some members of the governing council fought among themselves and filed a writ petition challenging the amendment. They argued that this was a violation of section 8 and 9 of the AP societies registration act of 2001.
Governing council members of Ananthapur district college under the National Education Trust linked to the Sri Satya Sai Baba National College Anantapur, G. Vittal, Jayachandra Chowdhary, K. Gowtham have opposed the decisions of the college chairman and his group.
The college trust was founded by social worker Sirivaram Adinarayana Rao. The trust runs a high school, a junior college and a degree college along with post-graduation courses. The views of the founder trustee family members have been ignored.
Even after some members opposed a decision to convert the institute from ‘aided’ to a private institution two months ago, the state government issued a GO in January last, taking over the aided institutions across the state. A few teachers and lecturers were deployed to government schools for a few weeks but they were taken back later.
Students with poor financial conditions prefer to join the graduation and post-graduation courses at the SSBN College. The management was collecting fees even from ‘eligible’ students under the reimbursement scheme, the students alleged.
