Pay through the nose for admission to pre-primary section

There is no regulation related to fees of pre-primary class which is often the only entry point to reputed schools and parents have no choice but to agree with the terms laid down by the schools. The state government had decided to regulate the pre-primary fees from the next academic year. But the government has failed to keep its promise to set up a fee regulatory committee this year.

After the agitation of parents of secondary school students,the state government set up a 19-member committee under the chairmanship of former bureaucrat Kumud Bansal to look into the fee structure of secondary schools and decide on some norms to regulate fees.

The then school education minister Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil in August had declared that the same committee would look into the fee issues of pre-primary classes as well. However,the Bansal committee said issues pertaining to the pre-primary schools should be dealt with separately.

R P Joshi,a member of the Bansal committee,confirmed that the issue of pre-primary schools was discussed at one of the meetings. “It was,however,decided that the same committee would consider the issue separately once the committee’s main work got over. So far,we haven’t received any instruction from the government about deliberating on the fees of pre-primary class,” he said.

Even as the admission process for pre-primary schools for the next academic year has already started,parents are wondering whether they will get some relief. “I have bought brochures of some reputed schools in the city. But the fee is over Rs 20,000 a year for playgroup which is quite a huge sum for a middle-class parent like me. I am not happy but I don’t know where to appeal. And if I don’t pay,my son will lose the opportunity to get education in a reputed school,” said Joshi.

Director of primary school education M R Kadam said the committee would be set up at the government level and the minister would take the decision. “So far I haven’t received any instruction to convene a meeting of any committee regarding regulation of pre-primary class fees,” he said.