Vijendra Mehra demands government to regulate school fee hike

Chhatra Pariksha Manch Himachal Pradesh strongly protested outside the Directorate of Higher Education Shimla against the arbitrary loot of private schools, exorbitant fees, huge increase in the prices of books and uniforms. After the demonstration, the delegation of the Manch met Education Director Amarjeet Sharma and handed over a demand letter to him. The Director assured that orders will be issued immediately to ban holding of general meetings, formation of PTA, holding of general meetings, hike in fees, hike in prices of books and uniforms in private schools. He will soon issue a notification in this regard. He said that he will soon send a proposal to form a law and regulatory commission to the government to crack down on private schools. Vijendra Mehra, Vivek Kashyap, Balak Ram, Balbir Parashar, Ramprakash, Kapil Negi, Pratap Chand, Amit Kumar, Anju, Pawan, Sanjay Samta, Devraj, Bobby, Ravi, Roshan etc were present in the performance.

Forum convenor Vijendra Mehra and co-convenor Vivek Kashyap have demanded the state government to form a law and regulatory commission to stop the arbitrary loot of private schools, huge fees, huge increase in the prices of books and uniforms. He has expressed strong anger over the increase in the prices of dress and books by up to 30 percent in the year 2023 and termed it as the failure of the education department and the state government. This is an act of robbing the pockets of students and parents. This is arbitrary loot and profiteering. In big private schools, private school managements make a commission of Rs 18 to 30 lakhs in a year. This amount is given as commission to the private school managements by depriving the parents of the discount they get in books and uniforms worth thousands of rupees for each student. This is in violation of NCERT, SCERT, CBSE and MHRD guidelines. Private school managements are looting directly from the parents, but the education department and the state government are silent. He has warned the state government that if the government does not take a positive stand on the law, then the Student Guardian Forum will open a front against the collusion of the state government and the education department with private schools. He has appealed to Chief Minister Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu to take initiative to implement the law to crack down on private schools so that seven lakh students and ten lakh parents of the state can get justice. He has said that due to the failure and connivance of various state governments, private schools have been continuously doing arbitrariness. Even during the Corona period, apart from tuition fees, private schools have been collecting annual charges, computer fees, smart class room, miscellaneous, cares, sports, maintenance, infrastructure, building fund, transport and all other types of funds and charges. Private schools have cleverly continued the loot by converting more than eighty percent of the total fees into tuition fees in the year 2022. Due to the failure of the government, the fees of the students have been increased by 15 to 50 percent in the last two years and the government is silent on this increase. He has said that the private schools are openly violating the guidelines of the Ministry of Human Resource Development of the year 2014 and the Education Department dated December 5, 2019, on the matter of fee collection, and are bypassing the role of the parents’ general assembly in deciding this. Despite the guidelines of the Education Department, PTAs have not been formed in 99 percent of the schools. Both the state government and the education department are silent on this. Private schools are still charging admission fees through the backdoor by charging annual charges and defying the 2016 judgment of the Himachal Pradesh High Court, which had stayed the collection of all charges. He has demanded the state government to immediately enact a law and constitute a regulatory commission to regulate fees, syllabus and admission process in private schools.