JNU Students Claim Administration Asked to Return Scholarship Money, Varsity says 'Misleading' Claim

Several students of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) claim the varsity has asked them to return the money they had received as part of the non-NET fellowship. The university, however, said the allegations are “misleading” and that it disburses the fellowship amounts to MPhil and PhD students as per the guidelines of the University Grants Commission (UGC).

JNU in a statement said that “It’s clarified that some reports in the Indian media alleging that the University has sought recovery of Non-Net fellowship from research students are misleading.”

“It is underlined that Jawaharlal Nehru University disburses Non-Net fellowship to students of MPhil/PhD programs as per guidelines prescribed by University Grants Commission,” the statement added.

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“The Junior Research Fellowship (JRF) is paid to eligible students by UGC directly to their bank accounts and the university only verifies and uploads relevant documents of such students on the UGC portal for disbursement,” JNU said.

The non-NET fellowship amount ranges from Rs 5,000 to Rs 8,000 a month and eligible students can avail of it for a maximum of five years during their MPhil and PhD. “The students are given the option to avail JRF for a period of five years during the MPhil/PhD programmes, if they opt to refund the amount of Non-NET fellowship already received by them. It is also pertinent to mention that a student cannot take any employment during the period of the fellowship,” JNU said.

Meanwhile, the Jawaharlal Nehru University Student Union (JNUSU) says it has met with officials of UGC and requested them to disburse non-NET fellowships for MPhil and PhD students. It also asked for an extension of the submission timeline as fieldwork of scholars was affected due to the closing down of the university and libraries due to Covid-19.

The student union said in a statement its representatives visited the commission on October 27 and met with the additional secretary of UGC Satendra Singh and its undersecretary. “We received a positive response, that the UGC has not been hesitant towards giving extension, and as earlier months, will deliberate and soon come out with a notification regarding the same,” it said.

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JNUSU also claimed that several research scholars have not been receiving their non-NET Fellowship for the past 8-9 months, however, the JNU Administration cited lack of funds and non-disbursal of funds from UGC behind not providing the fellowship amount. The students union said that UGC officials said, “they have been regularly sending funds to JNU, and any issue happening regarding funds need to be dealt with at the level of JNU Administration”.

“The UGC even cited that a fund of 120 crore rupees has been disbursed on 26/10/21, which will reach the JNU Administration,” JNUSU said. The student’s body demanded the JNU to clear all pending non-NET fellowships and return money to students from whom it has “illegally” recovered the amounts.

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