School denies admission to non-Bohra students

Updated on: Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Suzanne Mathias (name changed) canceled her daughters admission from a convent school and admitted her to another. "The method of teaching at this school has always been appreciated by parents of students", she said. Mathias, though, got the shock of her life when the school put up a notice on the premises which said non-Bohra students would not be admitted from the coming academic year. "If that was not all, this year they also announced that even siblings of existing non-Bohra students would not be granted admission in the school, even though the school website claims otherwise", she said. This and such other instructions have been announced at Hasanat High School in Marol, say parents.
Parents of non-Bohra students now plan to stage an agitation against school authorities.

Education inspector for the ward P R Pawar said, "No school can change their admission policy overnight, there are rules that everybody has to follow. Schools can have their preferences for a particular community but they cannot deny admission to students from other communities. When the department checked with the school on Monday afternoon, the authorities denied all allegations made by parents. We have now asked the parents to come and meet us." Parents have regularly been receiving instructions from the management about the changes to be implemented and the latest letter said the dress code for boys will change from February to kurta-pyjama.

A parent also alleged that the school was also planning to segregate Bohra and non-Bohra students into two separate divisions for the same class but didnt go ahead with the move after the Parents-Teachers Association went against it.
When TOI contacted the school principal Pramila Kudwa, she defended the move to change the dress code. Whats wrong with boys wearing kurtas she asked. She curtly refused to comment on the other allegations made by the parents, including the recently proposed changes to the admission policy.

Parents say they have long been trying to get in touch with the management authorities, but to no avail. We dont even know who the management is.Nobody has ever attended any PTA meetings or signed their name in any notice. "Even teachers who have taught in the school since the past ten years have not seen anybody from the management", claimed another parent. Parents are now worried that they might soon have to seek admission elsewhere for their wards. "The problem is that there are very few good schools in the vicinity. Even at the schools situated far from our area, the admission forms have already been sold out so we will be left with no option", said a parent.

School denies admission to non-Bohra students

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