Govt scraps MP quota in new KV entry rules

NEW DELHI: The Union government has scrapped the discretionary Member of Parliament (MP) quota for admissions to the Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVs), according to the revised admission guidelines issued by the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (KVS) on Monday.

The move comes days after KVS had put admissions under ‘special provisions’, including MP quota, on hold till further orders.

Under KVS Special Dispensation Admission Scheme or MP quota, which was introduced in 1975, a parliamentarian could recommend a maximum of 10 students from their respective constituency every academic year for admission in classes 1 to 9. With 543 MPs in the Lok Sabha and 245 in the Rajya Sabha, a total of 7,880 admissions every year were possible against this quota across 1,248 KVs in India. At least 1.43 million students study in KVs at present.

There had been a long-pending demand from MPs to either increase the limit or do away with the discretionary quota.

According to the revised guidelines issued by the KVS — an autonomous body under the Union ministry of education — several amendments have been made under the ‘special provisions’ section. The Centre has also scrapped some other quotas, including that of 100 children of education ministry employees, children and dependent grandchildren of MPs and retired KV employees, and the discretionary quota of school management committee chairman, who, in most cases, is the district magistrate.

Admissions under the special provisions are over and above the designated class strength.

Over the years, excessive admissions were taking place under the MP quota due to large number of requests, said a senior KVS official. “The excessive admissions had become a major challenge due to limited infrastructure. It was also distorting the teacher-student ratio in KVs. Therefore, it has been decided to do away with the MP quota and some other quotas under the special provisions section of the admission,” the official said, requesting anonymity.

Recently, several MPs, including Congress MP Manish Tewari and BJP’s Sushil Kumar Modi, had demanded that the MP quota to KV admissions be done away with or its limit increased.

Tewari said, “When I became an MP in 2019, I couldn’t find 10 people to fill up my KV quota. The economic distress that has been induced even pre-Covid by the policies of this government, today, I have 8,563 requests for 10 KV seats and that’s why I had requested for quota to be a raised or scrapped.”