Nitin Bhatia, living in North Delhi’s Kamla Nagar area, is planning the future of his three-year-old daughter, Neha. These days he is living in fear whether, Neha, will pass the rat race of nursery admissions.
It is a nightmare for all parents in the national Capital to get admission for their children into nursery. The arduous process of nursery admissions is commencing on January 1. As per the guidelines by the Delhi Government, nursery admissions would be spread across three months with the last date of submission of forms across the city schools on January 22 and the closing date of admission process is March 31.
“We have given out elaborated set of guidelines for the nursery admissions. like every year, schools shall make 25 per cent seats available for Economically-Weaker Section (EWS) and Disadvantaged Group (DG) category at entry-level as per the High Court guideline. The admission forms shall be given out to parents till the last date of submission,” Director Education, Padmini Singla told The Pioneer.
Education activist and lawyer Ashok Agarwal had filed a petition to challenge the order of the High Court, which quashed the guidelines from the lieutenant Governor. “We felt the guidelines were in favour of the parents with the l-G giving a uniform guideline but after the High Court quashed the order, we filed another petition to challenge it. We have appealed that the order given by the single Bench then be taken back and l-G’s guidelines be adapted again,” Agarwal said.
While Singla said the Government is working to make the process smooth, the worries of the parents are unending. “As far as we understand, the distance of the school is one of the main criteria of getting points to clear a way out in the admission at a school. But it is a critical situation for us since we are not sure if our rental agreement would be enough for proving the eligibility for this section,” grieved Bhatia.
The child is given admission into nursery on the basis of points out of maximum 100 points. The process is strenuous because the competition to get through the range of criteria, varying with schools, is confusing and harsh for a parent to comprehend.
The criteria for which points are given includes distance of the residence from school, another sibling studying in the school, if a parent is alumni of the school, female, first child, transferred from another State and others.
Singla said that if the confusion is due to the criteria, it was not something that Government or Education Department could help with as there was a High Court order allowing the schools to make their own criteria.
“last to last year, we had given out a uniform criteria but then High Court gave the schools authority to go ahead with setting their own criteria thus we cannot help it,” she said.
The Aam Aadmi Party Government had raised the issue of making nursery admissions easier but even though they are in process of amending the Delhi Education Act 1975, this year the guidelines remain unchanged. The amendments which are yet to be passed by the Central Government would end the point system and screening interview for nursery admissions.
The only criteria that will continue to remain would be under the Right to Education Act where a child will be given out admission to the nearest schools in his residence.
Sumit Vohra, who runs an online admission portal, said even though the Government is trying to bring in transparency, the criteria set by schools is very discriminatory. “If you see the criteria where points are given for a parent who has been the alumni of the school, it automatically segregates those who wish to send their children to a reputed private school… only the privileged gets the privilege. Here schools also get to choose the number of points for each criterion. They usually give more points to a preferred criterion,” he added.