INDEFINITE HUNGER STRIKE
By Parents and Teachers
Against Corruption and Exploitation in Education
From 13 April, 11.00 am onwards, at Azaad Maidan, Mumbai.
Inspite of laws, court orders, using false assurances, the Govt. has colluded with the unaided schools lobby and allowed unscrupulous exploitation of parents & teachers. While fees are hiked in the name of teachers salaries, whereas they are not being paid their legitimate dues. Hence, we the parents and teachers have come together to expose and resist the exploitation.
Parents have been continuously complaining, including through our organization Forum for Fairness in Education an NGO, over the last decade and have sought and often got support of the judiciary. Yet the private unaided school management lobby, which manages the Govt. (e. g. the appointment of Kumud Bansal as Chairperson of the Committee) has thrown out of the window the law of land, namely Prohibition of Capitation Fee Act-1987 and also all other related Acts, Rules including Secondary School Code.
Over the last three years, like several other scams, the shamelessness has spiked to unbearable levels. The Govt. has kept appearances by issuing GRs only to be rightly thrown away by Courts as, they have no legislative backing. It is obvious from the behaviour of the Govt. that school managements have hiked fees more than 150% in the last three years. The justifications for the increase in tuition fees have been to pay salaries & arrears as per the VI Pay Commission to teachers. But most of the teachers have not been paid the salaries as per the norms, inspite of up to 150% increase in the school fees, which should much more than cover the salaries. Therefore, we demand:
1. Limit (ceiling) on fee hike and permit fee hike only once in 3 years.
2. Refund of fees, if there is any element of profiteering.
3. Enforce Prohibition of Capitation Fee Act-1987, with well defined legitimate fees. covering VI Pay salaries.
4. Review Fee structure from 2008 onwards, of all private schools charging more than Rs. 6000/- per year and refund of all capitation fees collected till date.
5. Immediate implementation of VI Pay Commission & arrears with transparent pay-fixation.
6. Protect teachers against victimization, harassment, hire & fire policy as, teachers respectability is the key to students’ character building.
7. Transparency in Service condition including issuing of copy of the service book and monthly detailed salary to the teachers. Payment of PF and Gratuity as per the Govt. norms.
8. Penalize extortions, in the name of admission fee (up to 2 lakhs), Security Deposit (up to 2.5 lakhs), Imprest Money (up to 1 lakh), Activity fee (up to 30000 per activity). School Essentials (up to Rs. 50000), Building Fund (up to Rs. 50000), Admission Forms (up to Rs. 8000) etc. Also Stop compulsory purchase of uniforms, books, stationery, school essentials, and worksheets leading to exploitation.
9. Enforce truly democratically elected PTA representatives in place of sham PTAs and to maintain transparency in the functioning of PTA.
10.Stop interviews for Pre-Primary or Primary admissions, as per RTE Act. Also enforce RTE Act, including 25% reservation for the weaker & disadvantaged group of children.
11.Cover unaided schools under RTI and enforce web-publishing of accounts and facilities including affiliation details of all private schools.
12.Collection of all fees should be in the name of school only and official receipt/s must be issued for all payments.
THE CRUSADE AGAINST CORRUPTION IN EDUCATION
Contact: Jayant Jain – 9323131300; Raju Tirmalle – 9821256607; Sheila D’mello – 9820979079; Sunita Srivastava – 9821534545; Rajiv Patel – 9833733365; Sandeep Chavan - 9422081894
