This is an archive article published on June 27, 2021
Over 250 complaints of denied RTE admissions, PCMC issues notice to 15 schools
Jyotsna Shinde, PCMC administration officer (education), told The Indian Express on Sunday that the civic body had received complaints from parents that schools were refusing admission to their wards.
Shinde said the schools are complaining that the state government, which is supposed to reimburse the fees of such children, has not made any payments so far. (File)
The education department of the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation has received more than 250 complaints against 15 to 20 schools for allegedly refusing to admit students under the Right to Education (RTE) Act. The PCMC said it will ensure that children from poor families get admission in the schools concerned.
Jyotsna Shinde, PCMC administration officer (education), told The Indian Express on Sunday that the civic body had received complaints from parents that schools were refusing admission to their wards. “It is mandatory for schools to give free admission to children whose annual family income is less than Rs 1 lakh. However, some schools are refusing to give admission to children from poor families,” she said.
Shinde said the schools were complaining that the state government, which is supposed to reimburse them for education of such children, had not done so. “School managements contend that they have not received reimbursement from the state government and, therefore, are finding it difficult to run their institute,” she said.
“We have issued notices to 15 to 20 schools against whom we have received complaints. We have two verification committees. We have sent all parents with complaints to these committees, which will force schools to give admission to their children provided their documents are in order,” she added.
Rajendra Singh, president, English School Assocation, said, “Schools are refusing to admit children for free because the government refuses to reimburse their amount. I also run a school in Bhosari area. We have, so far, given admission to more than 500 poor children yet the government has refused to reimburse the fee.”
Dominic Lobo, whose family was running National English School in Sangvi, said, “I had to shut down my school as the government refused to recompensate my schools. The amount was over Rs 15 lakh. It was difficult to run the school and, therefore, three years ago we had to close it. Children from Sangvi are now suffering as they have to go long distances to attend school,” he said.
Singh said several school managements were finding it difficult to run their schools. “The government owes a lot of money to some schools. It seems there is no concrete policy to take care of this… This scenario will persist till the government acts decisively,” he added.
Story continues below this ad
There are 3,464 seats under the economically weaker section (EWS) quota in 147 schools. The entry point is Class I, where 25 per cent seats are reserved for children under the RTE Act.
– Stay updated with the latest Pune news. Follow Express Pune on Twitter here and on Facebook here. You can also join our Express Pune Telegram channel here.
Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives.
Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees.
During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa.
Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died.
Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More
3 min read
