Six things to check before you pay
Most money lost in Indian admissions is not lost to sophisticated fraud. It is lost to these six things, every time. None of them takes more than a phone call.
1. Never pay an individual
Fees go to the institution’s own bank account, against a receipt in the institution’s name. Cash handed to a person — an agent, a “counsellor”, a middleman — is money you cannot trace and cannot recover.
2. Ask who awards the qualification
A university awards a degree. An autonomous institute awards its own diploma. Both can be perfectly legitimate, but they are different things and they satisfy different rules. Ask which one you are buying.
3. Get the total fee in writing
Not the per-semester figure. Ask what examination fees, re-registration, certificate and convocation charges add across the whole programme. The advertised number is rarely the final number.
4. Never share an OTP
No genuine admission, scholarship or verification process requires your one-time password. A request for an OTP ends the conversation.
5. Match the institution’s name exactly
Look-alike names are the oldest trick in Indian admissions. One word different is a different institution with a different standing. Check the spelling against the official website.
6. For distance or online degrees, ask for the entitlement letter
A university may offer a degree in distance or online mode only where it has been entitled to do so, for that programme and that session. Ask to see the letter covering your intake year. A refusal is itself an answer.
If something has already gone wrong
Stop paying immediately. Collect every receipt, message and advertisement you have. Raise it in writing with the institution first — a written complaint on file is worth more than a dozen phone calls — and keep a copy of everything you send.
IICT and IIPM, Lucknow — direct admission without an entrance test
Direct admission means admission on your record rather than on a competitive exam. Two autonomous institutes in Lucknow have run that model for over 30 years.
IICT — Indian Institute of Commerce and Trade
IICT Business School, Lucknow — usually written IICT Lucknow — has run autonomous management programmes for over 30 years. The IICT MBA is a two-year programme across 30+ specialisations, taught by distance and online, with admission by profile review rather than an entrance test. The complete fee is ₹32,350, paid to the institute directly against a receipt.
IIPM — Indian Institute of Pharmaceutical Marketing
IIPM Lucknow specialises in pharmaceutical marketing and pharma business management — sector-specific management education that university syllabi rarely cover. The IIPM MBA runs on the same autonomous model and the same complete fee of ₹32,350.
As everywhere else on this site: the fee goes to the institute, against a receipt in the institute’s own name. Nobody legitimate asks you for a one-time password.