With no passport and having invested nearly $6,000, foreign students from the African subcontinent studying in a city college are knocking on the doors of Bangalore University (BU) for justice. These students, who are pursuing BBM and BCA courses in east Bengaluru, said they are being forced to pay the fee for the entire three-year course, which is $8,700, to get their passports back if they leave mid-way.
“An agent contacted me and offered to get me an engineering seat. I paid $2,900 to the agent. But when I came here, I was told that there were no engineering seats and forced to enrol in a BCA course. They took my passport and are asking me to pay up to get it back,” said Patrics Mukanda.
Many others, who were at BU to meet the Vice-Chancellor (VC) on Friday, said the college is not even giving them a bonafide certificate to register for a visa. Bosco Kaweesi, Managing Director, Siddi Education Welfare Society, said, “It has been months since they arrived, but they haven’t been able to register with the Foreigner Regional Registration Office. In some cases, African students are promised a good college but end up in a not-so-good one. When they ask for a no objection certificate (to leave mid-way), they are asked to pay.”
After meeting the students, BU VC B. Thimme Gowda said a committee will be formed to look into the mechanism in place in other States and formulate guidelines. “If there are specific complaints, we will send a team to attend to them,” he said.
