Sibal rejects steep fee hike for IIT students !!

There will be no steep fee hike for the students of the Indian Institutes of Technology, according to a decision taken by the IIT Council on January 21.

Chairing the IIT Council meet here, Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal rejected the Anil Kakodkar committee proposal for five-fold increase in fee for undergraduate programme of the IITs.

The Kakodkar committee, set up by the government in October 2009 to study the roadmap for the autonomy and future of the IITs, had recommended that the fee be raised from Rs 50,000 to Rs 2 to Rs 2.5 lakh per annum.

As the committee report came for discussion at the 42nd meeting of the IIT Council Sibal rejected the fee hike proposal saying “such a hike would prove a deterrent to a large number of IIT aspirants,” a ministry official said. The Council asked the committee to rework the fee structure taking into account the aspirations of all sections. During the meeting, Sibal announced setting up 50 research parks at a cost of Rs 200 crore during the 12th Five Year Plan period.

Under the programme, industry will undertake research on various subjects with the support of experts from the IITs.

The research parks have been proposed to be set up on public-private-partnership (PPP) model. One such research park has already come up in Chennai.

The meeting took note of the fact that credit-based practices were being followed by the IITs to promote students from one semester to the next, and agreed that academic bodies of the IITs should consider acquisition of credits as a criteria for students and granting of degrees to bring uniformity.

The issue came up following submission of Dhande committee report on uniform and homogeneous criteria for promoting students in the IITs.

Kanpur IIT director Dhande, who headed two committees, presented reports on a “uniform criteria for promoting students from one semester to the next in the IITs and on the “requirement of infrastructure for research”. Both reports have been accepted. Each IIT at present has its own criteria for promotion.

The Council decided that a panel for visitor’s nominee for a particular department would be created which all IITs could use for faculty selection. “This will ensure timely selection of professors,” the Council noted.

It also decided that the appointment of directors should be through advertisements so that a wider base was created.

“It was decided that in principle approval may be granted for setting up an institute in Mauritius with the help of the IITs,” an official said.

At the meeting, a presentation was made on adopting cyber security as part of the curriculum for the IITs. So it was decided that a committee be set up to develop a roadmap for the future and give a report in next three months.
Source Sibal rejects steep fee hike for IIT students