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ShareAhmedabad: The future of around 500 students from Gujarat studying in Australia has suddenly become uncertain.
The Global Campus Management Group (GCMG) that was running the five educational institutions where these students were studying, has collapsed, and its colleges have closed.
Besides the students from Gujarat, there are nearly 3,000 students from India who now face a bleak future because of the closure of the GCMG colleges. The colleges, located on campuses in Melbourne and Sydney, provide tuition in hospitality, design, English language, fashion and secondary education.
The colleges that have closed are the GCM Fashion Institute, Meridian International School, Meridian International Hotel School, International Design School, and the Meridian College. The Australian authorities have assured that no student of the closed colleges will be left without a place at a different college, or a refund of the outstanding fees.
According to a press release issued on Friday by the office of the deputy prime minister's office, the GCMG entered into voluntary administration on Thursday. Elaborating on the meaning of 'voluntary administration', the official spokesperson of the Australian High Commission in New Delhi said the phrase is used in company law.
"A group which is unable to run its institutions because of financial constraints, declares that it has gone into 'voluntary administration', making the appointment of an administrator necessary to run it," the spokesperson said.However, the spokesperson also gave the assurance that the authorities will take care of the students who had been affected by the colleges' closure.
The deputy prime minister's press release states: "International students studying at the [closed] colleges are covered by a comprehensive safety net, with the first preference being a place in another similar course at a different institution if possible. Where a place cannot be found, the Education Services for Overseas Students (ESOS) Act guarantees the students will receive a refund of their outstanding fees."
The press note further says that meetings had been arranged to brief students affected by the closure. "Meetings will be held in Melbourne on Monday (9 November) and in Sydney later in the week," the press release says.
An overseas educational consultant operating from Ahmedabad said on the condition of anonymity that Meridian College had been vigorously marketed in Gujarat by overseas educational consultants. "There must be nearly 500 students from Gujarat in GCMG-run institutes," he said. "We stopped recruiting students for the group about a year back as we were not getting any feedback about the its financial health."
