MUMBAI: A female staff employed as a peon/aaya at a nursing college in Ahmednagar, has been shown as ‘lecturer’ in a pharmacy college run by the same management.
A housekeeper in the nursing college is also ‘head of department’ (HoD) in the pharmacy college. While the principal holds the post in two nursing colleges, he is also listed as lecturer in a third.
At least 19 people are shown to be employed in two or more colleges run by the management on different posts. These anomalies came up when the state’s Fee Regulating Authority (FRA) was examining proposals by these colleges seeking fee revision. Salaries of employees are shown as the institutes’ expenditure to seek fee revision. Even as nursing colleges are proliferating in the state, the FRA has started noticing deficiencies in the fee proposals submitted by some.
The management in question, Gramin Samajsevi Sanstha, runs four colleges in Ahmednagar – one offers as BSc (Nursing) course – Dr Kolpe Nursing College, the other two – Shir Swami Samarth Nursing College and Shri Sai Baba Nursing School – offer Revised General Nursing & Midwifery (RGNM) and Revised Auxiliary Nursing & Midwifery (RANM) – and Dr Kolpe Institute of Pharmacy offering diploma in pharmacy. While the FRA had fixed fees for B Sc (Nursing) course on August 17, it has decided to recall the decision and to look at all proposals afresh after giving an opportunity of hearing to the principal and trustees of the college. The FRA noticed the anomaly while examining the trust’s fee revision proposal for Shri Swami Samarth Nursing College.
“…It is pointed out that the same person is shown as employed and being paid salary during the same period from three different colleges run by the same trust… there is reason to believe that deliberate attempt has been made to practise fraud...,” the FRA noted in a recent order. Along with trustees, the FRA also called the chartered accountant for hearing, as there were discrepancies in balance sheets too. By showing full staff strength, colleges justify their proposals for fee hikes, said a member.
An official from the college, however, claimed it was a mistake by a junior operator while feeding data on the portal. “Due to the pandemic, we were short-staffed... We will be showing all our documents to the FRA during the hearing,” said the official.
An FRA member said that there is rampant proliferation of private nursing colleges in the state – maybe due to the pandemic. “We’re coming across deficiencies in many colleges seeking fee revision," said the member, adding that these colleges set up shop only to seek reimbursement of fees from the state.
The FRA also noticed an anomaly in proposal submitted by Spandan Nursing College, Bhandara. Seven other proposals scrutinised by FRA were incomplete and full of deficiencies and were sent to the colleges for rectification.
