Human Resource Development Minister Geetashree Oraon on Tuesday asked District Superintendent of Education (DSE) Jayant Sinha to constitute a five-member committee to monitor the schools’ high-handedness in hiking the fee, normally by 10 percent every year.
The committee will have four members from the HRD department and one member of Federation of Jharkhand Abhibhavak Mahasangh.
“The committee will frame specific rules for the unaided schools of the city which will be obligatory for them to abide by it,” said Oraon.
The decision came at a meeting held by the HRD Minister with the private school principals to discuss various issues, including denial of free education to underprivileged students in unaided private schools, arbitrary fee hike and overloading in school buses. As many as 20 school principals took part in the meeting.
There is no law permitting the schools to increase the fee every year by 10 percent. The fee can be increased or decreased depending upon the actual requirement of a school.
Meanwhile, on the issue of overloading and worn out buses plying on the city roads putting life of children at risk the school authorities have assured to replace the worn out buses with new ones in this summer vacation and will also purchase new buses to curb the menace of overloading.
“New fleet of school buses will welcome the students when they return after the summer vacation. Moreover, the problem of overloading will also be addressed by the school authorities,” said JVM Shyamali Principal AK Singh.
Besides, schools’ arbitrariness in charging readmission fees each time during the admission was also discussed. Oraon on the issue has ordered school to charge the admission fees only once at the time of admission.
The Minister also questioned the principals for their failure to full up the 25 per cent reserved seats with the students hailing from weaker section of the society.
Kairali School principal Rajan Verghese responding to the allegation commented, “lack of information among the Below Poverty line (BPl) students regarding commencement of schools admission procedure for nursery classes from the month of November restricts the entry of reserved category students. The need of the hour is to extend help in generating awareness about the provision among target students.”
He further added that the schools have no objection on providing free education to reserved category students.
After hearing the plea of school principals, the HRD Minister asked the school authorities to place a board outside the entrance gate.
Meanwhile, members of Federation of Jharkhand Abhibhavak Manch have expressed their satisfaction over the decisions taken at the meet.