Chandigarh, May 21 -- Panjab University (PU) failed to recover fees to the tune of Rs.13 crore from scheduled caste (SC) students availing the Post Matric Scholarship (PMS) scheme from Punjab, an audit of the varsity's 2023-24 accounts has revealed. Under the centrally sponsored scheme, the state government transfers non-refundable fees and maintenance charges into students' bank accounts, from where they are expected to deposit the amount with their institution. In September 2018, PU formalised this arrangement, directing all departments to take written undertakings from eligible students committing to pay their fees once the scholarship money reaches their accounts. That system, the audit found, existed only on paper. Across four academic sessions, starting 2018-19 through 2021-22, the fees went unrecovered across university departments, regional centres and constituent colleges, taking the dues to Rs.13 crore. The year-wise breakup shows the problem was not a one-time lapse but a pattern: Rs.3.4 crore unrecovered in 2018-19, Rs.4.6 crore in 2019-20, Rs.2.9 crore in 2020-21, and Rs.2.4 crore in 2021-22. What compounds the finding is the absence of basic record keeping. The audit states that the university has no documentation of how many students actually received scholarship amounts, and no tracking of recoveries from constituent colleges. For two of the four years examined, PU has been unable to even provide a count of beneficiarystudents. The audit also flagged that it remains unclear whether similarly situated SC students from other states - Chandigarh, Haryana and others, were also being exempted from paying the fees upfront. When the observation was raised, no reply was furnished by the department. PU registrar Yajvender Pal Verma said, "Partial scholarship funds have already been released by the Punjab government, while some are still pending. Once the remaining funds are received, the university will reconcile the records and address the audit objections."...