The meeting of the student representatives of the three campuses of BITS Pilani with the directors of the campus began around 6.30PM on the 9th May, 2018.
The director of BITS Goa began by stating that the directors were aware of the seriousness with which the students believe of this matter, and that the directors of respective campuses have heard the voices of the students. He said that illness of the Vice Chancellor was an unforeseen event and that the Vice Chancellor represents BITS as a university. He went on to say that it is their responsibility to ensure the VC was in good health and that he was in AIIMS as this meeting was happening. Prof. Raghurama went on to say that the Vice Chancellor, as the executive head was ultimately in-charge of all these issues. However, in the absence of the VC, Prof. Raghurama stated that the four directors of BITS Pilani would like to address the issue. After about twenty minutes of introductory speech, Prof. Raghurama finally let a student of BITS Goa ask the first question.
Q: What are the steps the directors have taken in the last five days of protest?
Ans: Prof. Raghurama said that he met the students in the auditorium, and that he was in touch with the other directors of BITS and the VC.
Q: What is the administrative mechanism to bring about a change in the fee structure?
Ans: The fee decisions are a part of the budget. The budget for the institution is made for a year, with a long term plan in mind. Prof. Raghurama cited the example of Project Lakshya, stating that feedback had been taken from faculty and stakeholders involved in various aspects of that project. After a budget is made, it goes to the finance committee, which looks at the budget and presents it to the Board of Governors. Once the board approves, it has to be approved by the general body, after which it becomes “actionable”.
Q: When will the next Board of Governors meeting be?
Ans: They happen once a year. They have authority to only approve the budget. The constitution says, “they will meet as often as required”. Prof. Sundar added that there is a specific process to be followed to convene a meet of the board, and that anyone cannot call for a meet. There will be no meet of the board before summer. Any decisions taken by the board will be informed to the students. The board will probably have no meet over the summer, or in the next six months for that matter.
Q: How is the fee hike being justified, considering the inflation rate? What is the breakup of the 15%, if inflation is not a major factor?
Ans: The 15% hike is not for existing students. For the existing students it will be less than that, and you were told about a maximum possible hike for 15% when you joined. The Government of India revises the salaries by adjusting the Dearness Allowance, which is usually an increase of 8-10% over the last five years. Inflation rate is not applicable uniformly across all sectors.
Q: The annual report mentions the difference between on campus and off-campus revenue. Considering factors like declining WILP, and lack of funding from DST could not have been forseen in 2010 when the long term goal was made, what is being done to increase off-campus revenue to reduce burden on the students?
Ans: The government funding you speak of is not a part of the institute budget. It definitely helps in building the infrastructure of our college, but it is not a part of the budget. At most, the funding from that is used to fund the running expenses of the funded project labs. Also, WILP is not just a revenue generator for BITS. WILP is an educational innovation that is unparalleled in terms of what it tries to achieve. Prof Sundar also stated that there is no annual report that says that WILP is not living up to its expectations. He also said that if there are problems with WILP, he would be addressing them with his team. Both of these are not the subject of discussion today.
Q: The professor to student ratio is roughly 1:19 in BITS. IITs and NITs have a better ratio and so do some other private colleges. Considering the fact that BITS is focusing on expansion, why isn’t BITS concentrating on improving the faculty first?
Ans: The number isn’t the only thing that matters. The quality also does. The private colleges you speak of might be taking in recently graduated PhD students as Associate Professor and within a few years promoting them to Professor. We could have done that a long time ago, had we wanted to. But we don’t, because quality is more important. Also, the VC and the directors are conducting interviews for faculty positions – 200+ interviews have been done so far.
Q: While you might be recruiting faculty to solve the problem, student intake has been increasing, worsening the ratio. Why have resources been diverted towards expansion despite lack of faculty?
Ans: Numbers are not the only thing that matter. A few years ago, BITS had a lot of lecturers (without PhDs). Now, we could easily recruit more lecturers to improve the ratio, and that is something we might consider. We are in the process of recruiting more professors. Also faculty, especially good faculty, when deciding whether to join or not look at where the institute will be in ten years – we need great facilities to attract great talent.
Q: With increase in intake, coupled with increase in fees, how can BITS maintain quality of students? How will BITS maintain its aim of “affordable, quality education” as stated in the Bulletin?
Ans: Increase of intake will obviously lead to a drop in cutoff. But that doesn’t mean the quality has reduced. If the fall in cutoff were not proportional to the rise in seats, that may be a cause for concern. That is not the case, however. A number doesn’t just decide the quality of the student. Furthurmore, you can’t just judge student quality by the incoming batch -you need to look at the track record of the graduating batch as well. A combination of these two factors, perhaps could be used as a measure for quality. Affordability of fees is person dependent and income dependent.
Q: How can current students of BITS afford the fee when it’s been compounding multiple times?
Ans: It is not a question of affordability. It is a question of planning. When you are joining BITS, you need to plan for it.
Q: Loans are sanctioned on the basis of fee in first year. When the fee increases, students end up exhausting the credit that was sanctioned to them, due to the multiple increases in fee. Also, SBI loans are collateral free only upto Rs. 20 lakh. How do you plan on tackling this?
Ans: These are real problems – many banks are willing to give loans to students of BITS Pilani students. These are issues that we can discuss and sort out, after consulting with everyone involved.
Q:If the announcement is made in summer break, how do we communicate with you?
Ans: You are still welcome to give your opinion. We can communicate as we are communicating now. Summer break does not have to mean a break in communication.
Q: Can we get an answer by tomorrow evening?
Ans: No, I cannot guarantee anything like that. We will present your issues to the Board, that is the only thing in our hands.
List of demands by the students:
- The current fee structure should continue for all currently enrolled students in the academic year 2018-19.
- Fee hike to be imposed on only the new incoming batches – no fee hike for incoming students after they’re a part of BITS.
- Make it clear how much they’ll pay during their stay at BITS.
- Until these concerns are addressed by the Board of Governors, SWD should not issue fee notices for next semester.
Released on 10th May, 2018 around 4AM, just hours after the meet concluded. Compiled by Rohit Dwivedula and Shanmukh Kali Prasad. Disclaimer: This article is a summary of the meeting that captures the essential points. Every single line spoken in the meeting (that lasted more than 2.5 hours) has not been transcribed word-by-word.
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