The Hindu : Karnataka News : Bangalore University hikes fee for correspondence courses

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Friday, Dec 17, 2010
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Karnataka

Karnataka

Bangalore University hikes fee for correspondence courses

Krishnaprasad

Bangalore: The Directorate of Correspondence Courses and Distance Education (DCC&DE) of Bangalore University has increased the course fee for the academic year 2010-11 in the range of 20 to 30 per cent.

However, for first year BA and B.Com courses, the fee has been doubled — from around Rs. 2,000 at present to Rs. 4,000.

An official at the university said the increase in fee was inevitable as the cost of study material had gone up. Besides, the directorate had decided to introduce quality self-instructional study material.

“Kuvempu University is using this fee structure for its correspondence courses,” the official said and added that the directorate needed to pay a reasonable fee for institutions to come forward to set up study centres.

At present, there are 38,000 candidates pursuing various courses under the DCC&DE of the university and almost 75 per cent of these candidates are enrolled in BA and B.Com courses. For the business management (BBM) course, the fee is about Rs. 9,000 per year while the fee for postgraduate, diploma and certificate courses are in the range of Rs. 4,000 to Rs. 6,000 per year after an increase of 20 to 30 per cent.

The hike in fee has disappointed representatives of some of the study centres as they feel that the move will drive away students, particularly those from economically backward classes, to open universities.

“The fee charged by the Karnataka State Open University (KSOU) and the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) for the conventional bachelor's degree is less compared with the fee charged for correspondence courses by the State universities,” pointed out S. Mruthyunjayappa, a part-time teacher at a study centre.

However, an official of Bangalore University said the cost of preparation of study material would come down at open universities as they had more than one lakh candidates compared with a few thousand at conventional universities.

‘Affordable'

“Youngsters from rural areas, who come to Bangalore in search of jobs, enrol for BA and B.Com courses through correspondence.

It will be difficult for such candidates to spend Rs. 4,000 a year for the course as a majority of them work on low salaries. Many such candidates enrol at our centres because the fee is affordable,” said Vivekraju, who teaches at a distance education centre.

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