310 private colleges closed due to non-release of fee reimbursement: Harish Rao

Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader T. Harish Rao has revealed that 310 private colleges across the state have closed their doors due to the government's failure to release fee reimbursement funds for the past two-and-a-half years. The non-payment of salaries by private colleges has left teaching and non-teaching staff struggling to support their families.

"In a statement on Tuesday, BRS leader T. Harish Rao expressed his disappointment with Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy's inability to clear the fee reimbursement dues, putting these colleges in a crisis," the statement said. The leader emphasized that several colleges have already shut down due to their inability to pay building rents, power bills, university fees, and other management expenses.

Out of the 960 colleges that were operating in the state, 310 have already closed, and more are at risk of closure as the government continues to delay the release of fee reimbursement funds. Rao pointed out that the impact of these closures would be most severe in rural areas, where the availability of degree and post-graduate colleges is limited.

The closure of a single college in a rural area would leave hundreds of students, primarily from Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST), and Backward Classes (BC) communities, without access to higher education.

Fee reimbursement dues stood at ₹2,500 crore when the state was formed in 2014, and the BRS government had cleared them and continued the scheme. However, over the past nine-and-a-half years, the BRS government has only paid out ₹19,500 crore in fee reimbursement. In the nearly three years since the Congress took over, the dues have risen to ₹10,000 crore, according to Rao. The leader demanded that the government implement a system of timely release of funds for the scheme.