Hyderabad: Will the real DPS please stand up? After Rajeev Gandhi International Airport police arrested the managing partner of a ‘fake’ school located at Shamshabad on Tuesday, questions are being raised about how many such fake schools are thriving in the city.
According to officials at the District Education Office, Rangareddy, the management of the school in question, named Delhi Public School (DPS), had not submitted the required documents before opening the school last year and the incident came to light now following complaints lodged by some parents.
Officials reported that around 253 such unrecognized schools existed across the city which have not submitted proper documents like lease deed, infrastructure particulars, traffic NOC etc. Moreover, officials added that in some cases, school managements even submit fake documents in a bid to cash in on the booming business of education here. “Last month, we booked cases against six city schools which had submitted fake traffic NOCs to us,” said A Subba Reddy, district education officer, Hyderabad.
Officials, however,said there were no immediate plans to crackdown on all the unrecognized schools. The only action being taken against them is barring its students to appear for the class X board examinations. These schools, however, manage the issue by enrolling their students as private candidates for the examination, but some face a bleak future. The arrested in the case of DPS Shamshabad has been identified as Syed Farooq Hussain of Bahadurpura. In June 2012, Farooq along with Subhash Chandra Bose and MA Nazeeb of Bahadurpura opened two schools under the name ‘Delhi Public School’ in Shamshabad and Attapur.
According to police, several parents enrolled their students at both these schools thinking that they are branches of popular Delhi Public School chain. In the school’s Shamshabad branch, currently 140 students are enrolled and at Attapur branch there are over 200 students, police said.
It was not immediately clear what would be the fate of these students, but officials said other than getting admitted in a recognized school there was no way out. For the last four months, the accused reportedly stopped paying salaries to teachers and they stopped taking classes. On February 8, the accused locked the school at Shamshabad and switched off their phones, they also stopped visiting the Attapur branch.
Suspecting foul play, one of the parents, Ashok God, lodged a complaint with the RGI Airport police against the school management on February 9. “After the complaint was lodged, we cross-checked about the school with the Mandal Education Officer (MEO) and then we realised that the school does not have recognition from any authorized body. The MEO told us that they have issued three notices to the school management for operating the institution without obtaining proper permission from the government,” RGI Airport SI M Kasi Viswanath said.
Based on the complaint, police booked a case under sections 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 420 (cheating) of the IPC against the three managing partners of the school. Police said the accused had collected hefty amounts from the parents at the time of admissions. Acting on a specific alert, police arrested one of the accused, Syed from his house in Bahadurpura on Tuesday. During the interrogation, Syed told police that it was his associate Bose’s idea to use the popular brand name Delhi Public School to attract parents. He was produced before the court and remanded in judicial custody. A man hunt has been launched to nab the other accused.
Times of India | Hyderabad | 13th February, 2013 | Page2
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