Govt to set up panels to check school fee hike
SCRUTINY Move to prevent private schools from raising fee without valid reason
NEW DELHI: Private schools in Delhi may not be able to hike their fees without reason in the wake of the 7th pay commission, as the government has asked the district-level deputy directors of education to ensure that fee anomaly committees in their areas look into the matter.
Delhi’s chief and deputy chief ministers will also be meeting with local MLAs and education department officials on Thursday to hold further discussions on the issue.
In a bid to address the slew of complaints that the government has allegedly received from parents against fee hikes in schools, they issued a notice on Wednesday asking the district deputy directors of education to constitute a three-member committee, comprising themselves, an education officer of the zone and a chartered accountant, at every district to look into such grievances. The decision comes after the Delhi high court, last month, asked the government to constitute the panels before December 5. Parents can register their complaints with the committee in the prescribed format by paying a processing fee of ₹100 and private schools have been asked to make their financial records available for inspection.
“We had been getting complaints from parents about fee hikes in private schools, citing the seventh pay commission. Since it was impossible to deal with them at a central level, we needed to have a decentralised systematic approach to the matter,” said Atishi Marlena, advisor to deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on education.
She said that the issue of fee hike is not limited to a select few schools, but is a problem “across the board.”
The committee is expected to look into every complaint within 90 days and any unjustified fee hike will be rolled back and parents reimbursed.
“The inspection will happen at two levels. In the preliminary phase, we will enquire if the schools have money in their reserve funds, as the pay commission guidelines state that if such funds exist then fees cannot be hiked. We may also get chartered accountants to do an audit of the schools’ accounts,” said Marlena, adding that the committees will be functional once chartered accountants are hired.