Lahore High Court has allowed the administration of Shaikh Zayed Medical Institute to charge its students Rs350,000 for the first three years and Rs400,000 for the next two years of MBBS degree.
The detailed judgement was issued by the LHC public relations officer on Friday.
However, the court ruled that the Rs75,000 as admission fee was not justified.
The court held after the 18th Amendment, the medical school’s administration was under the government. The court gave the provincial government three months to re-constitute the board of governors for the institute and to refer the matter of the fee structure to the board for ratification.
The court ruled that during the three months, the college need not adjust any amount paid in excess of the tuition fee and admission fee authorised by board.
Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial made the rulings in a detailed judgment on a petition seeking directions for the administration to charge its students no more than other government-run medical colleges.
The court noted that the college was inaugurated on May 23, 2009 by the prime minister and that he had promised financial support to the college of Rs300 million.
The original PC-1 for the college had proposed financial support. The proposal was rejected in 2009 and again in 2011.
The college, as a self-finance institution, was left with no other option but to meet its financial commitments and obligations from its own revenue, primarily tuition fee.
The court held that the institute may apply for a financial bailout from the provincial governmental. On February 27, 2012 in an interim order the court had directed the administration to reduce fee from Rs400,000 to Rs200,000 per annum.
The court observed that the interim order should have been implemented but the institute complained that students started demanding adjustment of past payments.
It said this had resulted in a shortfall of funds to meet current expenditures and operations of the college were affected, the chief justice noted.
The court said the board of governors of the institute was the competent authority to fix the fees and that in its 33rd meeting on May 16, 2009, had fixed a schedule which was later endorsed by the government.
Unless the excess amounts charged by the college are ratified by board of the Institute, such amounts shall be adjusted to the respective students after the lapse of the period mentioned by the court.
The court further held that it was clear from various documents that the institute and its components were not owned by the federal government.
The college is to be run commercially as a public-private partnership.
In the 33rd meeting, the board had also approved the financial feasibility plan.
It was estimated that the college would have 75 local resident students, 10 foreign students, five employees’ children and 10 scholarship students.
In the proposed fee structure, foreign students were to pay $10,000 annual tuition fee, employees’ children Rs175,000 and scholarship students were to be educated using college funds.
Based on this fee structure, the annual projection of fee collected from students in their first and second years was Rs35.25 million and Rs39.65 million from students in their third, fourth and fifth years.
The breakdown of fee collection given in the financial feasibility anticipated that Rs9 million per annum would be generated from foreign students and employees’ children; and the projected fee in third year up to the fifth year of medical education for local students at the rate of Rs400,000 per annum would yield Rs4.40 million. LHC had made the ruling last year.
Published in The Express Tribune, April 19th, 2014.