New Delhi: Amid the crisis arising out of the spread of the highly infectious novel coronavirus, parents of school-going children are faced with a big issue to deal with — fee hike by private institutes.
Schools in Delhi have increased tuition fees, some by even 35 per cent, causing unrest among parents.
The parents are, therefore, reaching out to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) — via social media, by writing open letters and filing online petitions — and requesting them to resolve the issue.
A petition started by Amarpreet Kaur, a Gurugram resident, on change.org, says, “India on the whole is affected by this uncertain period. When companies are planning to announce pay cuts, lay-offs, leave without pay, several big and small businesses are impacted, in such a situation it is okay for school to charge a fee to maintain itself, but hiking the fee is totally unfair and insensitive.
“I request you to regulate the schools all over India and direct the state governments to ensure that there is no hike in this year and schools do not charge for services during this time which they are not providing,” she added in the petition addressed to HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’.
As of late Tuesday evening, the petition had more than 34,000 signatures.
The Gujarat government, meanwhile, has asked private schools not to increase fees when the country is facing an unprecedented crisis. No other state has issued such a directive yet.
In the National Capital Region, the Gurugram administration has asked schools in the district not to hike the fees after receiving complaints from parents.
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Sanskriti School cites financial difficulty for fee hike
One of the most prominent schools in Delhi — Sanskriti School — has announced massive hike in their annual fees.
The school, through a circular on 30 March, a copy of which is with ThePrint, said, “After DoE (Directorate of Education) audit for the year 2019-20 and the projected budget for 2020-21, the DoE has recently permitted and notified the following increase in fee — 20% for the year 2019-20 (payable from April 2020) and 35% for the year 2020-21 from October 2020”.
The school has cited “financial difficulties” because of increasing the salary of the staff in accordance with the 7th Pay Commission as the reason behind the fee hike.
ThePrint reached Abha Malik, middle-school in-charge of the institute, for a comment, but received no response until the time of publishing this report. Principal Richa Sharma was also contacted via email, and a response is still awaited.
Another prominent school in Delhi, Guru Harkrishan Public School in Greater Kailash, has also hiked its fee by 10 per cent for the 2020-21 session.
“Fee hike at 10 per cent for the year 2020-21. As fee booklets are not printed so there is no breakup of fee… it is a provisional amount, including some percentage of annual charges. Fees will be adjusted after re-opening of schools,” according to a message sent to parents by the school, which has been accessed by ThePrint.
ThePrint reached an official in the school administration via text and phone calls, but is yet to get a response.
The issue of fee hike, though, is not just restricted to Delhi.
A parents’ association in Hyderabad has also complained to the state government, claiming schools in Telangana have increased the fees.
An open letter to PM
A group, called the School Parent Community, wrote an open letter to PM Modi, urging him to look into the matter.
“As parents who rely on incomes from our jobs, we face the distinct possibility of increments being frozen with pay-cuts across the board. For business people, the scenario is pretty much the same,” read the letter.
The letter requested “complete reversal of fee hike” and an “option to pay the fee in installment”.
A Noida resident, who sends her daughter to Sanskriti School, told ThePrint she and her husband are unsure if they will be able to keep their jobs in such uncertain times.
“My husband and I have well-paying private jobs which is why we could send our daughter to an expensive school like Sanskriti, but these are uncertain times, we are not sure if we will be able to keep these jobs in times of such crisis. In such times, it’s very insensitive of the school to effect such a massive hike in the fee,” said the woman, who did not wish to be identified.
Also read: Why closing schools due to the Coronavirus pandemic may not be feasible
Dear Sir,
When all things are opened then why institute, college, IIT’s and university. Our ph.d. research work has been stopped from March 2020. Then why government is not opening the IIT’s and university for research scholar. Everyone knows that research work can not be done online. Ph.d. research works need labs of the institutes. Without working in the labs we can’t do anything. And PhD students strength are not huge. Government should give permission to the PhD students to start working in the labs of the institutes, IIT’s and universities from 1st July 2020. Sir please open the university and IIT’s for research scholars from 1 st July 2020.
In this epidemic, also parents asked to pay unnessesary computer, transport fees and meal fees which is not good
I am against so called mobile classes. On one hand we encourage our kids to stay away from mobile device due to harmful radiations and high impact on health of eyes.
School teachers on guidelines to follow the gimmick of online classes are sending hundreds of pages of books on parent’s mobile phones via whatsapp.
Asking kids to read from photo pages on mobile devise? Have school authorities and teachers gone insane?
Just in order to get meat out of parents earnings while many jobs are already at stake schools are playing this dirty game.
We must pay for what we get. Isn’t it?
As rightly stated before we buy mobile phone but we aren’t responsible for salary of engineers who designed that mobile. Education is also a product that sells hot.
If schools are not able to deliver the product then why parents are set responsible for salaries of teachers? It this justified?
We are bound to send our kids to private school because Govt school are far behind. No matter how much claims Govt education system makes, situation of facilities and quality of resources are not heart warming at all. I have personally visited many Govt schools across north India. The observations were far below claims made my Govt authorities. Developments happen only on papers and to click mere pictures and post on social media while ground reality had very sad figures and truth is behind the curtains of politics and scam of private education.
So teachers must not get salaries but are expected to make lesson plans, teach,test,evaluate and provide quality education. Teachers don’t have families to feed. Private school teachers don’t even have old age pensions.
Every year they increase their fees. In this time if they not increase school fees then also they will not suffer any problems. They have a sufficient bank balance to pay the salaries to their staffs. Dear PM sir please look into this and help parents ?
G. D. Salwan, Old Rajender Nagar, Delhi 60 has also increased the fees which was already too much considering the facilities they provide.
It is very unfortunate that we are all under lock down. The school authorities have no right to increase the amount of school fees in the name of their services. Some schools have started teaching online that’s nothing useful for the students and on account of this school is demanding fee from parents, how rediculous is this. Govt must stop such hiked fees of the school. Without teaching no fee. There must be rule for all.
If you’re running a business, it’s your responsibility to pay your employees, not that of the customers. Parents are customers. Schools don’t share profits with parents. Parents are not shareholders in schools. Parents are not supposed to burden schools expenses. Do you pay your mobile service providers extra because you’re concerned about the engineers salary? Schools are corporate houses and treat them like service providers. They are not 60s,70s educational institutions that believed in non-profit education. They are brands now, they have marketing teams, they sell their products. And if there’s no service, there should be charges.
And then which company hikes 35 % salary? This is daylight robbery.
Even in this difficult situation, there should be no fees for vacation period , if there is any. Like schools charge fees on quarterly basis, I.e April to June and June month always has summer holiday. So it’s our humble request from the parents side to our PM that please issue some direction to schools all over India not to charge any fees for summer break, if there is any.
Private education/schooling is a billion dollar scam and is a bi-product of inefficient and corrupt governments. Govts can invest and maintain a million strong army/police and latest weaponary but can’t hire efficient and productive teachers! Governments/politicians have outsourced education sector to private entities and extract money from them. Its a nexus, a cartel and a symbiotic relationship. Both parties benefit.
Birla vidya niketan in pushp Vihar Delhi has raised the fee by 20 %, fine. They have introduced a new payment head called Parent Teacher Association charges. Beat that!
A reminder to these parents that they should have insisted for better education through government schools long back instead of lamenting fee hikes now .Private is always profit oriented. I persume these parents might have studied I. Govt schools only.
If parents will not pay fees then school will not pay salary to the teachers and staff. Teachers also have family. Who is going to think about them. If govt want to give relaxation to the parents then they should also have to think about the teachers who are working so hard for their survival
Online classes are worthless connectivity issues are ramoant many in Govt schools have no smart phones internet connection or TV that deprives them of these classes some don’t even have stationary to work on
Private schools are buisness institutions.
The previous governments have encouraged this culture of Private education. they never paid any heed on increasing and making govt schools better.
This culture must end.
All private school must charge minimum fess.
There are thousands of students in the school.
education should notbe on sale.
it is for the nation building
At this stage of unprecedented crisis, people of India should unite and come forward to help India come out of Covid 19 viruses. Every individual whether rich, poor or middle class is going through the difficult situation so all the schools and institutions in India should roll back the fees hike with immediate effect.
School Mafia also kind of Corona Virus and there is vaccine in any of Govt. School can do anything at anytime, they can increased the Fees, they can fo4ce to every parent to pay the full fees during this critical situations and there is no restrictions over the School management.
Fees must be waive off till our kids not joined the school. And online ke bahane they are just taking 40min to 1.20 min classes and charging full fees… also asking for full Annual Fee 20,000 some of school has more fees…
Its our humble request to every Govt plz come up and stopped such thing from School management. There should be a laws where Govt only can increase/decrease the School Fee instead of any School Management.
Good suggestion
I am facing problem from NBFC’s like Earlysalary, Capitalfloat, Cashe who are not responding to moratorium requests and they r pestering for repayment everyday
Send mail to any NBFC and ask for refund within 3 days for March, 2020 till April 2020 if deducted and after 3 days send this mail to RBI complaint section
Verbal request and offers are not admissible in courts
You will get relief
Every year, in the name of admission fees they charges 10000 to 15000/-, in the name of medical charges 75/-per month, no lab, no computer teacher not a single book of computer but they charges 200 – 250/-per month, everywhere every parents are crying either Assam, Bihar, बंगाल, छत्तीसगढ़, DELHI, haryana, j&k, Maharashtra, Manipur, nagaland, odissa, Karnataka, kerela और tamilnadu. But All government have same attitudes, Why? Please any one have answer of these, January to march all parents start cry about fees hike after that no one bother. So enjoy & happy.
Schools in Delhi should withdraw demand for transport fee and mid day meal charges.
In solidarity with patents,
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