Cuttack: The authorities of Ravenshaw University have told Orissa High Court that self-financed courses was the only way to meet its budget deficit.

The varsity authorities told the court that it was facing a budget deficit of Rs 14.26 crore in an affidavit in response to a petition seeking quashing of new self-financed courses from the upcoming 2018-19 session.

The PIL, filed by Ravenshaw Bikash Abhijan, also sought the court's direction to convert existing self-financed courses into regular ones. It is currently pending before a division bench.

Terming the petition as "misconceived", the varsity argued that "introduction of such courses has enabled the University to meet the academic demands of the time and evolve its curriculum to the needs of society and the economy".

The university, during the 2018-19 session, estimates to generate Rs 41.59 crore from various courses "of which Rs 11,29,48,724 (Rs 11.29 crore) is from self-financing courses. Even including all receipts of the University is Rs 59,92,44,816 (Rs 59.92 crore) against a total expenditure of Rs 74,19,06,136 (Rs 74.19 crore). Therefore, the University faces a budgetary deficit of Rs 14,26,61,320 (Rs 14.26 crore)."

The affidavit filed by registrar Maheswar Agasti said: "The University has no other means of meeting its budgetary deficit other than through self-financing courses to ensure quality education."

Giving details of receipts and expenditure in the affidavit, the varsity clarified that during 2018-19, it would receive Rs 18.32 crore from the state government, Rs 13.61 of which would be spent on running expenses such as salary of faculty and staff members.

The balance amount of Rs 4.71 crore is for infrastructure/construction purposes, the varsity said.

Responding to allegations that the varsity was selling seats at the expense of merit, the registrar contended that the accusation was "fallacious and misleading".

"The University has introduced self-financing seats in regular courses so that the additional fees paid by the students on self-financing seats can be used to provide better infrastructure, equipments, facilities, laboratory apparatus, books in the department which will benefit the entire class whether regular or self financing," Agasti said in his affidavit filed on July 4.

He said "the University has taken such step to meet rising expenditure while ensuring quality education since the State government funding for regular courses is largely confined to staff salary and is insufficient to meet other expenses".