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Direct schools to go slow on fee hike

BHUBANESWAR: All Orissa English Medium School Parents Association (AOEMSPA) demanded that private schools should be directed to keep all fee hike proposals in abeyance.

AOEMSPA alleged that English medium schools proposed fee hikes ranging from 70 per cent to 200 per cent without consulting parents on the plea of paying salaries according to Sixth Pay Commission recommendations.

The schools have not been paying the teachers salaries at par with the State government teachers. Some schools have implemented the Fifth Pay Commission Recommendation only from January 1, 2009.

Therefore we feel that the exorbitant fee hike proposed for paying Sixth Pay Commission Recommendations is being done to fill the pockets of the principals and some management members, joint action committee of AOEMSPA charged. Members of the association said schools were generating surplus funds with the present fee structures. This surplus is adequate to pay the revised salaries as per Sixth Pay Commission. All the English medium schools have been spending huge sums on construction activities even when the pay revisions were imminent, AOEMSPA said. The association said, DAV Public School, Unit-8 has constructed four new buildings in the past three years at the cost of Rs. 5 crores knowing fully well about forthcoming 6th Pay Commission salaries. Therefore the proposed exorbitant fee hikes by the schools are completely unjustified.

The DAV Public School, Chandrasekharpur has introduced a package of Rs. 45,000 for fresh admissions which amounts to profiteering and commercialisation of education. AOEMSPA demanded that schools should be directed to consult the parents through the parents associations and reach an agreement with them about the proposed fee structure for 2009-10. They also demanded open audit of balance sheets of schools.

As the schools are running solely on funds collected from parents 50 per cent of the members of the School Managing Committees should be parents of the respective schools, AOEMSPA stressed. Fresh admission should be made on existing fee structures, it demanded.

It is to be mentioned that private English medium schools of the capital city had threatened to go ahead with the admissions with enhanced fee structure if State government failed to turn up for an amicable resolution to the controversy over decision to hike tuition and admission fees by March 15 next.

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