State threatens unaided schools with derecognition to complete RTE admissions

Unaided schools of the state have received derecognition notice from the state education department as schools have not registered for Right to Education (RTE) admissions. Schools have claimed they will not register unless the state pays the entire reimbursement amount claimed to be Rs 800 crore since 2012.

The notice states schools will be derecognised if they do not register online for RTE admissions for this academic year. As per RTE Act, private unaided schools should conduct admissions providing 25 per cent seats to marginalised students every year. For these admissions, every private unaided school has to register online.

School authorities claimed they are not threatened by this notice. Rajendra Singh, leader of Independent Schools Association, said, “The government cannot threaten us by this notices. The government has not paid reimbursement amount since last five years and they expect us to continue admissions and fund the entire elementary education of a student.”

These private schools claimed the government provides partial funds evey year at entry point level. “The state provides a minimal amount every year to manage the admission of students entry point level. But what about managing the education of those students till Class 8? And this minimal amount is not even sufficient to manage admissions then how will we manage the entire education of students?”

On the other hand, the state education ministry has requested schools to cooperate as they will provide pending reimbursement amount soon. Bharat Malik, an educationist, said, "What does the goverment mean by soon? On one side, the goverment is asking us to cooperate and on the other hand they are sending us notices threatening to derecognise our schools. What is the government trying to do?"

The state has dispersed Rs 154 crore out of pending reimbursement amount of Rs 302 crore. The schools claim amount is much more approximately Rs 800 crore.