Get ready to pay more fees to get admission in Top B-School

This time minimum 10 of the country’s premier B-Schools have either increased fees or proposing an increase of anywhere between 6-19% for the session of 2016. These B-Schools citied the reasons behind this increase are inflation and rising operational costs.

Some leading B-Schools such as XLRI, International Management Institute (IMI), MDI-Gurgaon, SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, XIM-Bhubaneswar and IIM-Ranchi have already given green signal to fee hikes, others institutes such as IIM-Calcutta, IIM-Kozhikode, IIM-Udiapur and WeSchool will take decision over this soon.

The increase in the fee-including those who are still considering it-come at a time MBA’s popularity seems to have fading. However, most B-Schools given the argument in their support that these hikes have been forced due to increasing inflation, higher administrative expenses and increasing salary of the faculty.

There are some institutes which have not increased their fees from last three to four years. IIM-C which have not increased the fee from last four year, had hiked the fee by 50% to Rs. 13.5 lakh in 2010.

This increased fee might affect decision of many students, though availability of educational loans will mitigate the impact. Ajay Antony, VP, Triumphant Institute of Management Education, said, “Fees do play a role at the time of final selection of an institute especially for students with multiple offers in hand.”

Sumit Mitra, HR, Godrej Industries, said, “Generally, students don't mind paying more for a well-established B-school. But where relatively new institutes are involved, fees may have a role. Students know that when it comes to the top management institutes, they will get their money's worth even if there is a fee hike. Also, with education loans easily available, a fee hike is hardly a deterrent.”

IIM-Udaipur, which charges Rs. 8 lakh for two-years programme, is also planning to increase the fee of Rs. 1 lakh for the coming session. Director, IIM-Udaipur, said, “We are aware that a huge EMI affects the choices students make. Having said that, we have to cover our expenses and this will be the first time we are increasing fees since we came into existence.”

IIM-Ranchi increased the fee by 16%, whereas older IIMs such as IIM Bangalore, Ahmedabad have already increase the fee for their PGP courses. XLRI is planning to increase the fee by 7% for the upcoming batch.