lack of awareness and apathetic attitude of the Education Department has ensured that more than 50 per cent of the total seats available for the students of poor parents in private schools under universal Right to Education (RTE) Act in Uttarakhand are vacant.
The data of the Department reveals that only 13,079 students have enrolled themselves in the ongoing academic session against a total available 27715 seats in the lowest class of the 4457 private schools of the State.
The tardiness of the Department in enrolling new students could be gauged from the fact that 21,798 students had taken admissions last year under RTE.
Udham Singh Nagar district with 4,599 admissions under RTE is at top of list this year while 3,331 students have taken admission in the Dehradun district.
The data shows that very few admissions took place in Rudraprayag (133), Bageshwar (146) and Tehri Garhwal (292) districts this year.
The State Coordinator RTE, Sunil Bhatt told The Pioneer that the data of admissions is updated till July. He added that more admissions would take place in coming months.
The convener of the State RTE forum Raghu Tiwari said the main objective of inclusion of the students of lower strata of the society with that of higher is not being fulfilled as many big private schools are still reluctant to give admissions under the act.
A retired school Principal U S Gusain said that the major reason for poor show is the inactiveness of the Department and the lack of awareness about the act.
Under RTE the private schools are bound to reserve 25 percent seats in their class I for the students of poor parents.
The education Department reimburses the fees of the students till the student reaches the highest class of that school.
The RTE mandates that the students belonging to Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), non creamy layers of Other Backward Castes (OBCs), patients of leprosy and AIIDS should be the beneficiaries of 25 percent reservations under RTE. The section 2 E of RTE includes the individuals with an annual income of less than `55,000 as the beneficiary of the aforesaid scheme under the RTE.
The students belonging to the above two categories could opt any school in their neighborhood and enroll their wards in class I of that school.
The schools are bound to give admissions in the 25% seats and incase the seats are not filled they should keep these seats vacant.
These vacant seats should be filled only by the students belonging to the underprivileged sections any time during the academic session.
The Education Department reimburses the lower of the monthly tuition fees of the school or `1,383 per month per student to the private schools.
The Department also opens a bank account of these students and transfers `1550 for Mid Day Meal (MDM), Rs 150 for textbook and Rs 400 per year for uniform in this account.