Students, teacher demand continuation of govt subsidy
Jagannath University will have to run by its own income from October if the Jagannath University Act is not amended.
In that case, it will be the first self-funded public university in the country.
However, the students and teachers of the university demand continuation of government subsidy.
According to the Jagannath University Act, the university will have to run by its own fund after five years from the date of declaring it as a public university.
In response to continuous demand by the students and teachers, the then Jagannath University College under the National University was declared as a full-fledged public university through a gazette notification in 2005.
‘The government will continuously decrease subsidy for the university and from the fifth year since the date of announcement, the university will have to bear cent per cent expenditure from its own income and sources,’ reads Section 27(4) of the act.
As per direction of the act, from the beginning the university authorities set a higher monthly tuition fees for the students compared to other public universities.
When monthly tuition fee for a Dhaka University student is Tk 25-30, a JnU student has to pay Tk 100 as tuition fee. Other fees of the university are also higher than any other public university in the country.
‘The act was formulated consulting with the teachers and students of the then Jagannath University College who desperately demanded for converting the college into a university, even agreeing to the condition that the university will have to run by its own funds,’ Osman Faruk, the then education minister, told New Age.
‘We calculated that if the monthly tuition fees and other charges were increased gradually, the university, which has a huge number of students, would be able to run by its funds in five years,’ he added.
In fact, JnU was not the only public university that got the approval during the last four-party alliances government under such agreement of running the university through its own income.
Five other public universities i.e. Moulana Bhashani University of Science and Technology, Haji Mohammad Danesh Science & Technology University, Comilla University, Noakhali University and Jatiya Kabi Kazi Nazrul Islam University, are also functioning with the target that these universities will have to run by their own income in 10 years from the date of starting those universities.
Considering monthly charges for students at the public universities too cheap, Faruk said, there can be two options: either to make all the public universities free as the expenditure for collecting tuition fees is higher than the collection or to stop subsidy on student fees for research works.
However, both students and teachers of JnU want to have the privilege of getting government subsidies like the other public universities in the country do.
Whenever the university authorities imposed any additional charge to increase its income, they faced protest from the students.
Demanding equal benefits like any other public university, Masudur Rahman, a JnU student, told New Age, ‘We pay higher fees than the students of any other public university do, but we don’t get any extra facility from the university,’
‘From the beginning we have been demanding equal benefits like other public universities get, since the students don’t agree to pay higher fees,’ said vice-chancellor Prof Mezbah Uddin Ahmed.
‘We have applied to the ministry through UGC that it would not be possible for us to run by our own income,’ he added.
University Grants Commission chairman Prof Nazrul Islam told New Age, ‘We have already forwarded the application of JnU to the ministry for reviewing the act so that it can receive subsidy.’
He also observed that laws of the public universities should be uniform.
The education minister declined comments on the affairs of JnU.
