A local court has directed the police to lodge an FIR against a Sector-34 institute for duping a student of ₹2.9 lakh by issuing a diploma instead of the promised degree.
The order came on the plea of Shivam Malhotra, a resident of Patiala, who had approached OXL Enterprises, Sector 34, in 2012 for a degree in animation and multimedia through their OXL School of Multimedia.
The affairs at the school were being managed by Kuljinder Singh Sidhu and Nidhi Kaur Sidhu of Sector 50-C, Chandigarh, and Dinesh Sood and Monica Sood of Sector 66-A, Mohali, in various capacities.
Malhotra claimed that he was informed by them that OXL Group was highly reputed for imparting multimedia education and was affiliated to universities recognised by the University Grants Commission (UGC) and other statutory organisations.
It was also claimed that the courses offered by the institute were recognised by the Karnataka State Open University, Mysore, and that a bachelor of sciences (animation & multimedia) degree will be imparted to the qualified students.
As such, he paid ₹2.9 lakh for the three-year course and got admission in the 2013-2014 session.
However, Malhotra alleged, no examinations were conducted and upon enquiring, he was told there was some dispute between the institute and the university that will be resolved soon.
But still no exams were held and instead of a degree, he was issued a diploma certificate on December 3, 2015.
Institute cannot issue valid degree: UGC
Through an RTI application, Malhotra said he was informed by UGC that a state university was not allowed to operate beyond the state limits and the said institute could not issue a valid degree.
Further, Karnataka State Open University was not recognised from 2013-2018 and therefore, students could not have been enrolled for academic year 2013-14.
On June 10, 2022, Malhotra filed a complaint to the Chandigarh IGP that was forwarded to the Sector 34 station house officer (SHO).
The police informed the court that efforts were made to trace the accused persons, but no clue was found and further the complainant also did not join the inquiry despite being issued a notice.
However, the court observed that the police had no right or power to carry out a preliminary inquiry to verify the credibility of the information supplied by the complainant and directed the Sector-34 SHO to register an FIR. The compliance report has to be submitted by February 28.