Madurai: The news has come as great relief to several students who aspire to pursue higher education in expensive universities. Madras High Court (HC) has ordered nationalized banks that the granting of educational loans not to refuse consideration of the fee charged by universities for providing laptops to students.
Justice P. Jyothimani said that the reason for ruling out such a decision that portable computers are not a luxury for students anymore, but are necessities in the present age. Moreover, Justice Jyothimani ordered the Indian Overseas Bank (IOB) to provide an educational loan of Rs 2 lakh to a Dalit student whose father is a daily wage earner and could not afford the fee of Rs 2.9 lakh charged by a private college in Coimbatore for a two-year MBA course.
As per sources, a petitioner approached the IOB on October 28, 2009, but no steps were taken to sanction the loan. He had to approach the court to make the bank sanction the entire amount of the college fee. The bank, on the contrary, stated that it could only sanction an amount of Rs 1, 40, 990, which was decided with the help of recommendations made by a committee, headed by HC Justice NV Balasubramaniam, formed by the state government for fixing the college fees charged for professional courses.
Furthermore, Justice Jyothimani made clear during the ruling of his decision that banks that provide educational loans should consider not only the tuition and hostel fee, but also the fee for books, examinations, laboratory, laptops, etc.
