Kolkata: Law colleges under Calcutta University have been alerted to refund semester fees if they collected any at the time of admission for the five-year programme.The notice issued by the university asked students and their parents to claim a refund of extra fees paid, as a notification regarding the fees was yet to be published.Calcutta University issued the notice following a meeting under the chairmanship of vice-chancellor Asutosh Ghosh on Oct 12 on the five-year BA LLB admissions. It advised guardians and applicants not to pay the first-semester fee until a notification on it was published. “If you have already paid, please contact your college immediately to claim a full refund of the first-semester fee,” the notice stated. It also advised students to pay the first-semester fee only after a notification was released.Amit Roy, law convener, said, “Since last year, we have separated the admission fee and semester fees to reduce the financial burden on students. But we received multiple complaints that several colleges were charging extra by clubbing the first-semester fee with admission fees, which they cannot do. The notice was issued to alert students and parents and we have asked colleges to follow CU norms for this purpose.”After multiple complaints were received and anomalies came to light, the university launched a centralised online admission procedure last year across 14 colleges for 17 courses, offering around 3,000 seats for the five-year BA LLB programme.Earlier, there was no strict procedure for law admissions. Although an entrance exam was conducted, the admission process lacked transparency. Roy noted they introduced a one-time seat-booking fee that remained unchanged even if a student switched colleges. “All these reforms are made to protect students’ interests, but after all these efforts, if some colleges violate the rules, students have every right to challenge them,” Roy said.
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