The IIEST director has appealed to the institution’s former students for a “generous contribution” to help students who are in no position to pay tuition fees because of the Covid pandemic.

Parthasarathi Chakrabarti, the director of the Shibpur institute, made the appeal on the occasion of a virtual global alumni meet on Sunday.

“I have appealed to the alumni spread across the globe for a generous contribution so that we could come to the aid of the students who are struggling to pay their tuition fees because of the pandemic. I have requested them to change their usual mode of contribution, which is directed towards creating facilities or providing scholarships, considering the financial constraints many students are facing,” Chakrabarti told Metro.

The annual tuition fee at the IIEST is Rs 1,25,000 and this excludes the annual hostel and mess charge of Rs 50,000.

An office bearer of the students’ senate, which had written to the institute seeking a fee waiver, said the students whose parents ran small businesses were among the worst-hit. “Many salaried employees are no better because their salaries have been cut and many have been retrenched,” he said.

The director decided to approach the alumni — on the occasion of the meeting of Global Alumni Association of the Bengal Engineering and Science University, Shibpur, — after the education ministry had last month struck down Chakrabarti’s prayer for a fee waiver, said an official of the institute.

The Shibpur institute was known as the Bengal Engineering and Science University before it became IIEST in 2014.

“We have approached the alumni to create some kind of a benevolent fund to come to the aid of students who are in distress,” said Chakrabarti.

Since the Union education ministry fixes the tuition fees of the institutes under the NIT council — the IIEST is part of the council — the institute decided to approach the ministry for a fee waiver for the needy.

An official of the institute said the scale of financial constraints was such that the director was knocking on as many doors as possible to help out students.

The institute follows a practice that allows full tuition fee waiver if a student’s annual family income is less than Rs 1 lakh. If the income ranges between Rs 1 lakh and Rs 5 lakh, he/she is required to pay half the amount.

“During the pandemic-induced shutdown of the economy, the institute has received waiver requests from all categories of students. Even students whose parents’ annual family income is more than Rs 5 lakh are seeking a waiver,” he said.

When asked about the appeal by the IIEST director, Anjana Ganguly Roy, the president of the alumni association said: “We have to hold discussions among the association to take a decision on the appeal by the director”.