Board exams start on Tuesday, parents file complaint against D Y Patil School for holding back hall tickets

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Sandeep Chauhan, vice-president of the Nashik and Pune chapters of Forum for Fairness in Education, which is helping the parents fight their case, said, “The school increased its fee in the year 2013-14 by 20 per cent. The parents agreed to pay the increased fee amount. But the actual problem started when the administration again increased the fee by 25 per cent more for the year 2014-15 without consulting the parents. Many parents here work in industries and they can’t pay such high fees.”

A letter was sent to the deputy director of education in February 2014, after which there was a meeting between the parents and the school administration. “We explained to the authorities at the meeting that as per the Capitation Fee Act, the school cannot increase the fee for the successive three years after increasing the fee once. We even told them that we were ready to accept a 10 per cent increase but the authorities refused to budge,” he added.

Since then, the issue has been followed up at the deputy director’s office but nothing has been done so far by the office. The school authorities pressurised the students and some of them paid the hiked fees. The school even asked many students to stand outside the classroom many times in the first, second and third term, as punishment for not paying the fees. Then, when the model examinations started, the students were threatened again that they will not be allowed to sit for the examinations and then again many paid. Now that 10-15 students are left to pay, the school has refused to give these students their hall tickets for the Board examination till they pay the new fees. We are ready to pay up as per the old fees but the new fees are too high,” said a parent who did not wish to be named.

According to the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education that conducts board exams in the state, under no circumstances can the hall ticket of a student be detained by the school. “What the school is doing is illegal and hence we went and filed a complaint with the police. Tomorrow we will go and meet the deputy director and the state board officials,” said Chauhan.

Despite repeated attempts to contact them, the principal of the school and deputy director of education were unavailable for comment.