Government officials and educational consultants have cautioned students, who want to study abroad, against fraudsters.

They have appealed to students, who want to go abroad for studies, to verify the authenticity of educational consultancies before proceeding with the documentation process.

Their suggestion follows growing complaints that a section of consultancies operating in the Kathmandu Valley has been cheating students in the name of sending them to foreign countries for studies.

Speaking at an interaction organised at the Kathmandu-based Media International, Nakul Baniya, under-secretary at the Ministry of Education, suggested to all to check the legality of educational consultancies through government agencies before making any deal for education in foreign land.

“Educational consultancies are mushrooming and some individuals have infiltrated them with the intent of serving their personal interests. Therefore, all should be aware of fraudulent activities,” he said. Baniya lamented that most of the people are eager to go abroad to earn money in the name of studies, pointing that this tendency has encouraged frauds.

“I request all those vying for international education to choose registered educational consultancies so that they do not get cheated,” he said. Rajendra Baral, president of the Educational Consultancy Association of Nepal, urged students to take precautionary measures against cheating by verifying the authenticity of consultancies before blaming others for fraudulent activities. “It will help them from being cheated,” he said. New directives governing educational consultancies have come into effect, Baral said, adding that they will take action against consultancies at fault.

Recently, the Central Investigation Bureau of the Nepal Police had taken action against eight education consultancies based in the Kathmandu Valley for sending Nepali students to Japan on study-abroad programmes by producing fake documents under the cloak of language institutes. They had collected Rs 1.5 million from each aspirant.

source: the himalayan times,20 July 2013