Schools violate HC order, hike fees beyond 15 per cent limit

Even though the high court has restricted schools from hiking the fees for the academic year 2016-17 beyond 15 per cent, parents from various schools have complained of getting notices of fee hikes through messages they were sent by schools informing of the date and time to collect the results of their children. A parents teachers organisation has said that schools are in outright contempt of the court order and the school department is doing nothing to curb the same.

Speaking about the issue, Jayant Jain, president of the Forum for Fairness in Education (FFE), said that even though the court had permitted schools alike to hike fees by 15 per cent, a number of schools had hiked the fees from 15 per cent up to 70 per cent. “Some schools have found a novel way to circumvent the court order by applying the hike to the pre-primary fees that parents paid last year and not to the primary fees that they had collected last year,” said Mr Jain.

Explaining the procedure, he said that as the pre-primary section is unregulated schools charge higher fees than that of the primary section. “Last year schools collected Rs 40,000 for KG and charged Rs 20,000 for class I. However after the court order rather than applying the hike to last year’s fees of Rs 20,000 they applied it to the KG fees. As a result of this, parents are now being asked to pay Rs 46,000 for class I. In light of this the fee hike is almost double,” said Mr Jain.

He added that schools from all over the city had resorted to this tactic and he has received complaints from parents whose children study in IES group of schools, Children Academy, Scholar, Hiranandani School, Garodia School Abhay International School among others in a meeting held on April 23.

“The parents have lodged complaints with the education inspectors and the forum has forwarded their complaints to the deputy directors office as well as the BMC education office as well, but nothing has come of it. In light of the new tactic it is clear that the schools are in contempt of the court order and the education department should be held responsible for this,” said Mr Jain.