Higher education is a tough deal, not only writing the entrance exams but the finances. Similar was the case with Sumit Thakur.
Sumit had completed his B. Com course from Kolkata in 2014 and was working in a local company and preparing for higher education at the same time. He wanted to get an MBA degree.
In March 2017, Sumit got an admission offer from Institute of Management Technology (IMT), Hyderabad to pursue the Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) course, which is as good as getting an MBA degree.
IMT on its website had suggested Punjab National Bank (PNB) as one of the banks to go for education loan. PNB’s website also listed IMT as an institute for which they do provide education loans.
24-year-old Sumit secured provision admission at IMT Hyderabad after paying the required 50,000 rupees and applied for an education loan of 12.6 lakh rupees at New Alipur branch of PNB in Kolkata on 24th March, to pay the first instalment of the course fee by 15th April.
However, till April 6, PNB didn’t sanction him the loan. After Sumit inquired bank officials for the reason, the bank said his father’s poor credit history was one of the reasons why the bank refused to give him a loan.
Seeing it as the last resort, Sumit wrote about his plight to the Prime Minister on 7th April. Meanwhile, IMT had extended the last date for submission of the first instalment of the fees from 15th April to 29th April. Sumit decided to wait for a couple of weeks, and if no help comes, he’d have to forget his MBA plans and ask IMT to refund his 50,000 rupees.
On 20th April Sumit received a call from the PNB officials who told him that his education loan will be granted.
The officials told him that they had received communication from higher ups inquiring about the incident and they even requested Sumit and his father to ‘take back their complaint.’
A happy and a little confused Sumit then logged onto the aforementioned website