4 FTII students on indefinite hunger strike against fee hike

Four students of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) on Tuesday are an indefinite hunger strike in a protest against the "incessant" hike in both academic and the entrance exam fees.

"There has been a 10 per cent hike in academic fees year on year since the batch of 2013. From the annual fee of Rs 55,380 from the 2013 batch, the fees for the upcoming 2020 batch has reached to Rs 1,18,323," the FTII students' union said in a statement.

It said there has also been an exorbitant rise in the Joint Entrance Test (JET) for both FTII and Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute (SRFTI) application fee.

"From Rs 1,500 in 2015, the entrance exam fee has gone up to a maximum of Rs 10,000 for JET 2020. As such the institute is making itself completely inaccessible to a large section of our population," the statement said.

The students demanded that the continuous 10 per cent fee hike should be revoked and reduced.

"Repeated appeals against these fee hikes for the past three years have remained unnoticed which has compelled us to take this drastic step of hunger strike," it added.

The students also demanded that the JET 2020 should immediately be stopped until the entrance exam fees are reduced.