Hyderabad, July 05: Providing the much-needed relief to both parents and the State government in these troubled times, the Admissions and Fee Regulatory Committee on Saturday ruled out a hike in the tuition fee for engineering and pharmacy courses.
The decision came as a pleasant surprise for students and their parents as a hike of about 10 per cent was expected.
Currently, the fee is fixed at Rs 30,200 under the convener quota and Rs 91,700 under the management quota for both engineering and pharmacy courses.
The decision turns out to be a financial boon for the State government which is facing a financial crunch. The government has proposed to cover about 60 per cent of engineering and pharmacy students under various scholarship schemes for backward classes, scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and also economically backward sections.
The committee saw no need to increase the fee as the authorities have already increased it by about 23 per cent during the past three years.
Though the fee should be increased only once in three years, officials had allowed fee hikes for engineering and pharmacy courses to support college managements which were supposedly ‘‘hard hit’’ by inflation and escalating maintenance costs. Sources said engineering college managements in rural areas urged the committee not to hike the fee as several seats were left vacant in their colleges last year.
With the finalisation of fee, the counselling for admissions into engineering and pharmacy colleges is likely to commence next week.
Andhra Pradesh State Council of Higher Education Chairman KC Reddy announced that notification for EAMCET counselling will be issued on July 9.
Further information will be incorporated in the notification, Reddy added.
–Agencies–