At least 10 of the country's top B schools have either hiked fees or are proposing an increase of anywhere between 6-19% for the Class of 2020, citing inflation and rising operational costs.

While the likes of XLRI, International Management Institute (IMI), MDI-Gurgaon, SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, XIM-Bhubaneswar and IIM-Ranchi have already approved fee hikes, others including IIM-Calcutta, IIM-Kozhikode, IIM-Udaipur and We School will decide over the next two-three weeks. Estimates suggest the hikes will be in the range of Rs 50,000 to Rs2.5 lakh, depending on the institutes.

These fee hikes — including those under consideration — come at a time MBA's popularity seems to have waned somewhat. Nonetheless, most B-schools say these hikes simply couldn't be put off given inflation, higher administrative expenses and the rising salary levels of faculty members.

Some institutes such as IIM-Calcutta, for instance, have not implemented a fee hike for four years now. It had last hiked fees by 50% to Rs13.5 lakh in 2010. "The decision will be taken at the board meeting in April," said IIM-Calcutta Director Saibal Chattopadhyay. While he declined comment on the quantum of increase, two senior faculty members told ET the IIM-C faculty council was in favour of raising the fees to Rs16 lakh, up almost 19%. "Otherwise, there is tremendous pressure on faculty to engage in other revenue-generating activities," said the faculty member.

The move may affect the choice of institute for some students, though availability of educational loans will mitigate the impact. "Fees do play a role at the time of final selection of an institute especially for students with multiple offers in hand," said Ajay Antony, VP, Triumphant Institute of Management Education, a leading coaching chain for MBA entrance exams.

"Generally, students don't mind paying more for a well-established B-school. But where relatively new institutes are involved, fees may have a role." Adds Sumit Mitra, head (group HR and corporate services), Godrej Industries: "Students know that when it comes to the top management institutes, they will get their money's worth even if there is a fee hike. Also, with education loans easily available, a fee hike is hardly a deterrent."

IIM-Udaipur, which currently charges Rs 8 lakh for the two-year programme, will also be pushing for an increase of Rs1 lakh in its March 31 board meeting, said its Director Janat Shah. "We are aware that a huge EMI affects the choices students make. Having said that, we have to cover our expenses and this will be the first time we are increasing fees since we came into existence," said Shah.

IIM-Ranchi hiked fees by 16% from Rs 9 lakh to Rs 10.5 lakh due to higher expenditure, said the institute's director BB Chakraborty.

Older IIMs at Ahmedabad and Bangalore already charge Rs16.6 lakh andRs17 lakh, respectively, for the twoyear post-graduate programme in management. After two consecutive hikes in 2012 and 2013, they have decided against increasing fees this year. Nor will IIM-Tiruchirapalli, IIM-Kashipur or even IIM-Lucknow, which bucked the trend last year by cutting fees by 10% to Rs10.8 lakh.

Experts, however, say top institutes can afford to raise fees even in a slow economy. "Ultimately, it's about value for money. If leading institutes feel that given their costs and the value they offer there is still room to increase the fee, they can go ahead and do it," says Narayanan Ramaswamy, partner and head (education practice), KPMG in India. "Every cost of running an institute has gone up, from amenities, facilities, even cost of electricity and water. The fee hike is understandable," he adds.

Globally, top-ranked B-schools, including Harvard Business School, Fuqua School of Business and Stanford, have raised tuition fees by an average of 4% this year. But global institutes offer more scholarships than Indian Bschools, though a chunk of the former's go to international students, says Mukul Gupta, director of MDI-Gurgaon.

Debashish Chatterjee, director of IIM-Kozhikode, which had reduced its fees for the 2012-14 batch to Rs 9.7 lakh to ease the burden on its students, says a decision on fee hike is pending. But he adds that the institute has incurred considerable expenses on expansion. "A decision will be taken by next month," said Chatterjee.

Several leading non-IIMs too have gone in for fee hikes. For instance, XLRI, which is guided by the fees fixation committee of Jharkhand, has been allowed to raise its fees by 7% from the current level of Rs14.6 lakh to Rs15.6 lakh. "It's to meet our capex and operational expenditure," said Fr. E Abraham SJ, director, XLRI.

XIM-Bhubaneswar and MDI-Gurgaon have both effected fee hikes, the latter by 6.4% from Rs14 lakh last year to Rs14.9 lakh for the 2014-16 batch, according to the institute's director Mukul Gupta. WeSchool Group Director Uday Salunke says they charge an extremely low fees of about Rs4.5 lakh for the two-year MMS course and have appealed to the government to increase the same by at least 7% for the forthcoming batch.

"Only a handful of the approximately 5,000 B-schools across the country are really good. And these premier institutes need to be more progressive to become centres of excellence. That involves expenses," said Salunke.

IMI Director-General Pritam Singh said the institute has increased tuition fees by 17.3% fromRs11.5 lakh to Rs13.5 lakh. At SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, total fees has gone up fromRs11.5 lakh to Rs14 lakh, including a newly introduced global immersion component. "We have added an extra amount of Rs2 lakh for global immersion for three weeks in top US B-schools. Also, hostel expenses have been increased by Rs 50,000 though tuition fees remain the same," said Sonali Kohli Mehra, deputy chairperson SPJIMR.

Source: Economictimes.com 

Tagged in MAT MAT test pattern MAT exam AIMA MAT exam structure

Like us on :