Bengaluru: About 50 students protested against alleged cheating by an educational institute in Chamarajpet, where they enrolled in a BEd degree programme. Some students were there for at least a year and did not write a single semester exam for the four-semester (two-year) course.Over months of their study, the protesting students said they repeatedly sought clarity on why the examinations were not conducted and why hall tickets were not issued. They said they were cheated out of Rs 35,000 semester fee.“There are more than 100 students facing the same issue. Only a week ago, we got to know the BEd institute is not affiliated to BU,” said Sitara, a student. Several students are women, many of them married, and looking for better earning opportunities in teaching after completing the course. A student said: “I am an assistant teacher at a private school, earning about Rs 12,000 a month. I took up the course to upskill myself for better income. We looked it up online and, through word of mouth, found out about this institute a year ago. However, there was confusion about which college we were linked with. The administrators said it was a college in the south zone.”Students were made to write assignments, which were said to be part of the 70:30 evaluation scheme for completing the course. Another candidate, Priyadharshini R (31), who quit her job as a nursery teacher and joined the BEd course a year ago, said the institute claimed to have links with 10 BU-affiliated colleges that offered management seats for BEd.“We later learned the institute is linked to a college that is allegedly run by them, but is not affiliated to Bangalore University. I completed my nursery teachers’ training at SVV itself. But that is a diploma-level course, whereas BEd requires university affiliation,” she added. She has been waiting a year to write her first-semester examination. As per Bangalore University, the BEd examination was scheduled for May 12 this year.The owner of the institute was unreachable when TOI attempted to contact.