MVR 190 Million Student Loans Unrecovered

A 2022 audit of the Ministry of Higher Education has uncovered a significant failure in recovering MVR 190 million in outstanding student loans from a revolving fund. The Auditor General's report shows that while MVR 3.1 billion had been disbursed to students through this fund by the end of 2022, only MVR 651.2 million had been repaid, leaving MVR 190.7 million uncollected. The majority of these loans—MVR 2.9 billion—are managed by external institutions including the Maldives Inland Revenue Authority (MIRA), Bank of Maldives (BML), and Bank of Ceylon (BOC) under agreements with the Ministry of Finance. The remaining MVR 134.7 million falls under the direct management of the Higher Education Ministry. The audit identified multiple failures across the system. The Ministry itself did not follow financial regulations to recover MVR 81.5 million of its portion. Meanwhile, both BML and BOC were criticized for inadequate recovery efforts on MVR 106.8 million in loans they managed. The report also noted that the Ministry failed to monitor whether the banks were fulfilling their collection responsibilities as agreed. — Source fragments: