Private schools say they are at receiving end all the time

​Hyderabad: Telangana Recognised Schools Management Association (TRSMA) alleges that they are being projected as bad apples for no fault of theirs. The private schools despite providing education to about 30 lakh students, from primary to high school level, receive all the flak in the world.

However, the real facts are different from what parents and the government authorities have been claiming making, the association argues.

Speaking to The Hans India, TRSMA president Srinivas Reddy said: "We have made our stand clear to the government that it can act tough and punish those violating the norms." 

One problem the schools are facing is implementing GOs issued by successive State governments. For example, 80 per cent of the private schools running in and around the twin cities and urban centers are not compliant with the fire safety norms. The fire safety norms had been issued after the unfortunate incident in which children were charred to death in Kumbakonam in Tamil Nadu. But, the school in the incident was being run in thatched houses or huts.

In urban centers like Hyderabad, most of the buildings are run in pucca buildings. Even the internal wiring used in such schools is not prone to causing any major fire accident, Srinivasa Reddy argues.    

Besides, by the time the fire safety norms were issued, there are hundreds of schools which had already started running in such buildings, he said.

Similarly, the private schools are asked to obtain police permission, annual renewal and the like which are very difficult to follow. When something happens, the existing school by default are considered violators, he pointed out.

Further, the TRSMA claimed it would not be possible to implement the existing rule that 50 per cent of the fees collected should be spent on the salaries of the teachers. Because there is an annual increase in the rentals or the lease of the building in which the school is running. Similarly, we have to pay more towards hiring teachers of certain subjects than the others to keep the school competitive with others. Also, most of the schools do not have playgrounds.

All this could be traced back to the fact that the earlier government had given permissions liberally to start private schools to boost the literacy rates in the United Andhra Pradesh. The private schools have positively contributed to this end but only to get blamed for it, he said. 

He said they had been asked to follow maximum fee in rural and urban areas by the government and schools are punished if they violate the rules.

In fact, a majority of schools collect somewhere between Rs 15,000 and Rs 40,000 per year, depending on the class and the infrastructure and standards of teaching. Most of the complaints come only from those parents who admit their children into high-end schools offering various additional facilities, like AC classrooms, swimming, horse riding and the like. 

Depending on the additional facilities such schools charge more. Parents should think twice about their affordability while admitting their children in such schools. Because quality education is also available outside such schools and even in the government schools, he said.