The key provisions include: PGDM courses of not less than 2 years, admission to courses shall not start before 31 March of the academic year, and academic session shall normally be from June 1 to May 31 of succeeding year.

The complete list of provisions touch upon the A to Z of a B-school’s functioning system, such as process for admissions, starting and ending time of academic session, duration of courses, fees, syllabus. Surprisingly the provisions do not touch upon the important issue of faculty selection.

But these provisions are coming at the right time. There have been several reports of approved B-schools charging exorbitant fees from students and having their own calendar for academic sessions.

Published in leading newspapers on 28 December 2010, the notification by AICTE states, “the Council has approved following provisions in terms of regulations for PGDM courses.”

The following are the major highlights of the provisions announced by AICTE: PGDM courses shall be of duration not less than 24 months; Admissions to the PGDM courses shall be done through common entrance test such as CAT/MAT or examinations conducted by respective state government; Model curriculum/syllabus for PGDM shall be issued by AICTE; Admission to PGDM programs shall be conducted by the respective state government through their competent authority designated for such purpose; The fees to be charged shall be approved by the Fee Fixation Committee of respective state government; The admission to courses shall not start before 31 March of the academic year; The academic session shall normally be from June 1 to May 31 of succeeding year.

The AICTE has stated that it is “mandatory” for all existing AICTE approved B-schools to file all their information on the above mentioned provisions before they start the new academic session.

AICTE is trying with this notification to bring about change in the functioning of approved B-schools, but that would not be much easy as the biggest challenge will be implementation.