NRI Students are Liable to Remit the Entire Committee-Approved Tuition Fee Without Bifurcation for Corpus Funds.

The petitioners are MBBS students admitted under the Non-Resident Indian (NRI) quota in self-financing medical colleges in Kerala.

Historically, the Admission and Fee Regulatory Committee (AFRC) fixed NRI fees at ₹15 lakhs, but for the 2017-18 academic year onwards, it enhanced the fee to ₹20 lakhs (and subsequently higher), directing that ₹5 lakhs of this amount be diverted to a "Corpus Fund" to subsidize BPL category students.

A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court in *Jubilee Mission Medical College* (2020) and a subsequent judgment in 2023 quashed the Government Orders initiating this fund, holding that the AFRC lacked legislative authority to bifurcate fees for such purposes.

The Supreme Court, in *State of Kerala v. Principal KMCT Medical College* (2025), confirmed that the Corpus Fund was unauthorized without specific legislation but directed that NRI students were not entitled to a refund and must pay the "entire fees" to the colleges.

Consequently, medical colleges issued notices demanding the ₹5 lakh "Corpus Fund" component from NRI students, which the students challenged in this batch of writ petitions.

1. Whether NRI students are liable to pay the ₹5,00,000/- component previously designated as the "Corpus Fund" despite the quashing of the fund-related Government Orders.

2. Whether the total fee fixed by the Committee inclusive of the disputed component constitutes the "entire fee" payable under the Supreme Court's mandate.

The court applied the Kerala Medical Education (Regulation and Control of Admission to Private Medical Educational Institutions) Act, 2017, specifically Sections 3 and 11 regarding the fixation of fair and non-exploitative fees.

It relied heavily on the precedent set in *P.A. Inamdar v. State of Maharashtra*, which permits NRI seats to subsidize poorer students but requires a valid legal framework.

Most crucially, it applied the directions from the Supreme Court in *State of Kerala v. Principal KMCT Medical College* (2025), which established that while the State could not create a Corpus Fund without legislation, the total fee approved by the Committee was reasonable, and NRI students must pay the "entire fees" to their institutions.

The Court reasoned that the petitioners' challenge was based on the mistaken assumption that the NRI fee was only ₹15 lakhs and that the ₹5 lakhs was an additional, separate levy.

However, the records indicated that the AFRC had actually enhanced the total NRI fee to ₹20 lakhs (or the subsequently adjusted higher figures), merely directing that a ₹5 lakh portion of that total be diverted to the State Treasury.

The Court emphasized that while the *diversion* of the money to a State-managed fund was found illegal in the absence of legislation, the Supreme Court specifically ruled that NRI students have no right to a refund of this component.

By directing students to pay the "entire fee" approved by the Committee, the Apex Court effectively confirmed that the institutional entitlement to the full ₹20 lakhs (or revised rates) remained intact for the purpose of college maintenance and subsidizing BPL students internally.

Consequently, the colleges' demand for the ₹5 lakh component was a demand for part of the approved tuition fee, not an illegal unauthorized levy.

The writ petitions were dismissed.

The Court directed that NRI students pay the arrears within six weeks, and any bank guarantees furnished by students shall not be encashed until the expiry of this six-week period.