Chennai: Private schools in Chennai are now raking in moolah and the Right to Education Act is slowly loosing its steam, admit elected representatives and highly-placed official sources.
“The RTE act is not taken seriously by several private schools and even when councillors or public representatives approach the school authorities, the managements treat us like political brokers”, fumed an AIADMK councillor.
When I approached a private school at Nungambakkam seeking an LKG seat for a daily wage earner in my ward under RTE, the principal said all RTE seats have been given to ‘education department officials’; please don’t come here was the instant response, he said.
“The private schools are minting money and I know a private school in Adyar accepting cheques for up to Rs four lakh for LKG admissions. Our Congress party brought the Right to Education Act, but the law is not being implemented in letter and spirit. Schools have now learnt the nuances of how to use the loopholes in the Act”, said a former Chennai deputy mayor R Karate Thiagarajan. Adyar is one of the areas where the school education department should conduct more stringent monitoring to ensure that the law is implemented.
For instance, the Act guarantees slum dwellers, if they are located close to the school within a few kilometres, but today places like Adyar and Besant Nagar hardly have slums and this provision fails to serve the purpose, he explained.
Parents suffer due to private schools and hardly action is taken against the schools due to their ‘high end’ contacts, Thiagarajan alleged.
However official sources with school education department said “The State has given access to 2,31,404 children belonging to weaker sections and they are now studying in private schools under the Tamil Nadu Right to Free and Compulsory Education Rules 2011. In three years, Rs.97.05 crores towards reimbursement of tuition fee to private schools has been sanctioned, the sources said.
“It is a fact that private schools fleece the public at the time of LKG admissions. This is due to lack of stringent action by school authorities,” said councillor Subash Chandra Bose, Opposition floor leader in Chennai Corporation.
