New Delhi, Apr 21: An IIM review committee has asked the government for a freeze on the fees for the courses offered by the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) till it submits its final report.

The committee, under the chairmanship of R C Bhargava, submitted its interim report on April 4 which recommended that the government ask all the IIMs to defer any increase in fee and keep it at the level of December, 2007, Minister of State for HRD D Purandeswari told Rajya Sabha in a written reply on Monday.

The panel said the fee could be kept at Rs three lakh or less as the case may be till it submits its final report to the government, she said.

The interim report has been forwarded to the chairmen of all the IIMs.

While all the IIMs have proposed hike in fees, IIM Ahmedabad has proposed the steepest increase of 175 per cent in the fees of its first year post-graduate programme for the session 2008-09, from the current Rs two lakh to Rs 5.5 lakh