The students, who were admitted in the college almost a month ago, went on strike Thursday demanding return of their documents or a written assurance from the college that they won’t have to pay for the course.
“We are 29 boys and four girls from Kashmir in this college, but this place is a mess. Besides, the college authorities have already started to demand fees from us, notwithstanding the promise of free education under the PMSS they made at the time of admission,” a student Yasir Ahmad Shah, a resident of Kupwara, told over the phone from Bangalore on Thursday.

“So we have gone on strike to demand our documents back or a written assurance that our education will be free of cost,” Yasir said. However, the authorities, he added, are demanding money from the students for returning their documents.

“Many of us today paid Rs 15,000 each to the college to get back our documents,” Yasir added.
The BTI is located in a remote area of the city and is without buildings or laboratories, the students said.
“This place is around 68 kilometres from the main airport of Bangalore. Market is around 3 km from the college, and we have to wait for Sundays to get the essentials,” another student Ibrahim Shah, a resident of Bemina Srinagar, said. “In Srinagar, at the time of admissions, we were shown picture of a five storey building, but no such building exists here. There are no laboratories, no equipments for us to study.”
PMSS was launched by New Delhi in 2010 in an apparent response to the ‘street intifada’ that year. The scheme, which promised a scholarship amount of Rs 1200 crore to the students of the state, saw implementation in 2012 but without any supervision from the state government. Consequently, the NGO and consultancies started acting as intermediaries, sending students to the not-so-reputed colleges outside the state. So far, around 14,000 students are said to have been duped by the colleges and their intermediaries.
Earlier on Tuesday, over 80 Kashmiri students, who were placed in the Cambridge College of Engineering in Punjab's Fatehgarh Sahib under the PMSSS, held protests against the college after it shut its doors on the B Tech students. The college had also refused to return the original documents, including the migration and No Objection Certificate (NoC) to the students.

In the BTI Bangalore case, the students were sent to the college by various NGOs and consultancies that organized a meet in a local hotel here. The college authorities had given on-the-spot confirmation letters to the students promising free education under PMSS.

“The Principal of the college (BTI) came to Srinagar where he met us in a hotel through a consultancy. Right there he handed over to me a confirmation letter with the stamp of college over it,” Ibrahim, who had left his B Sc to pursue B Tech, said. “I thought, why shall I waist money when I am offered a free education? Who wouldn’t have trusted that confirmation letter?”

“I reached here through a NGO named ‘People’s Forum’. They promised me free quality education in this college. And here I am now cursing myself,” another student Tanvir Ahmad, resident of Sarai Bala here, said.

BTI’s Principal, HS Nanda, refuses to accept that the students have been duped. Talking to , he said the students have “developed anxiety due to uncertainty over the scholarship money.”
“There is no issue related to infrastructure, but these students have developed anxiety because they are not assured about the scholarship money. We will take care of it,” Nanda said, insisting that only 16, and not 33 students, were admitted in the college.

“We only have 16 Kashmiri students here, and they all were given admission under the PMSS,” he said.

(Courtesy: KR)