Fee dues “gone”? GO says pay up
CM pitched DBT to students from 2026–27. The government’s own order says pre-2026–27 dues to colleges still have to be settled — and told the High Court it would start doing that by July 31 and August 15. The BJP-led Centre isn’t in this fight; Telangana is, and students shouldn’t be the collateral for someone else’s spin.
The new DBT system does not erase fee-reimbursement dues from earlier years.
From 2026–27, Telangana will send fee reimbursement straight into students’ bank accounts under a DBT system. That much is on paper. The same paper also says the old dues are still the government’s problem, not students’ or colleges’. According to G.O.Ms. No. 7 dated April 29, 2026, the new rules apply only to students admitted from 2026–27, and “all admitted dues” up to 2025–26 “shall continue to be settled”. Migration to DBT “shall not… extinguish” those liabilities.
A report this week read the Chief Minister’s speech as code for writing off arrears. The document record says the opposite, and the state told the Telangana High Court it would release reimbursement for seniors by July 31 and start first‑year payments by August 15. The court recorded those undertakings and set the next hearing for August 20.
Direct-to-student is overdue and welcome; pretending it erases yesterday’s bill is not. The Congress government now running Telangana needs to match the GO and the court dates in practice — not with a line that vanishes when you open the order.