Despite having no valid approval, these 56 branches of foreign institutes ran courses charging students, 25 thousand strong, around Tk. 75 crore annually in tuition fees. It therefore leaves us wondering as to how this could happen when UGC watchdogs were supposed to be monitoring the activities of such institutes. It appears that the administration woke up quite late when already these institutes had opened branches in Dhaka and some other cities releasing catchy advertisements in the media.

These allegations pertaining to opening of campuses of foreign universities without obtaining permission from designated authorities need to be further gone into by way of separating the chaff from the grain. There are also allegations that some fake institutes have fleeced students in exorbitant sums and we strongly recommend that these should be made to pay back the money and brought under the law without further delay.

But it also remains to be said that there is a huge void in the higher education sector that needs to be filled through collaboration with reputable foreign universities apart from establishing fully-fledged private universities. We understand some of them are already doing well by offering MBA and other degrees at one fourth or one fifth of the tuition fees required in the country of origin. Such institutes having expatriate and local qualified faculties need specific rules and regulations to operate smoothly.

We hope the UGC and the Ministry of Education would look into the matter and take pragmatic decisions on the basis of ground reality and national interest within a specific framework of rules.