Huge Hike in Medical Fees in Karnataka

The annual fee charged by top private medical colleges for undergraduate medical and dental courses in Karnataka is likely to go beyond Rs 5 lakh from this academic year.

According to a report submitted by the fee fixation committee headed by a retired high court judge, the fee differs from college to college based on the facilities provided at the institutes. “As per our information, the fee recommended for top medical colleges is Rs 5 lakh and above,” said a sources from the state department of medical education.

Currently, annual fee of l Rs 4.25 lakh is charged by private colleges from students. Despite of a fee concession for the 40% government seats (or 1,400 CET seats) in private colleges, students are charged Rs 55,000 per annum.

With the removal of concession, 85 per cent seats in private colleges will be filled up by NEET ranking and the rest 15% by NRI quota.

Despite of many attempts by the state medical education and higher education ministers to convince the managements to share the seats, the fee will not come down. The sources said, “Colleges are ready to bend in seat allocation, but not in fee concession.”

A representative of the management of one of the top medical colleges in the state said, “When VS Acharya was the medical education minister, he told that government spends around Rs 5 lakh per student on medical education. When they can pay for students in government medical colleges, let them pay for us too.”

State government has formed a fee fixation committee following the Supreme Court direction to fix the fee at medical and dental colleges across the state.

Dr Sharan Prakash Patil, state Medical Education Minister, acknowledged there were hurdles. “Private colleges are ready to share seats, but their demand is equal fee for all the 85% seats without any concessions. No government can do that. However, we have yet to open the fee fixation committee report.”