New Delhi: The Centre has decided to put on hold the IIT council’s decision to increase the fee of M.Tech programme by 10 times.
The IIT council, the highest decision-making body of the premier technical institutes in the country, had announced the decision to bring the M.Tech course fee on par with B.Tech courses at its meeting in September. The council is headed by Minister of Human Resource and Development (HRD) Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank.
The council had maintained that the hike would discourage non-serious students from applying for the M.Tech programme. IIT-Delhi Director V Ramgopal Rao had said that the M.Tech programme had recorded a dropout rate of 50 per cent as students treated it as a “stop-gap” arrangement till they got a job.
However, news reports on Wednesday claimed that the HRD ministry has put the decision on hold. The council will consider the proposal afresh at its next meeting, .
IIT aspirants across the country had protested the hike and had demanded rollback of the decision. The HRD minister had to face students’ protests during his recent visit to BHU campus.
Some reports claimed that the strident protest by JNU students against fee hike could have prompted the HRD ministry to put the decision on hold.
