Schools not to comply under RTE this academic year

Updated on: Thursday, May 17, 2012

With the state government set to implement the RTE act this year, setting aside 25% of seats for students from the economically weaker sections or backward classes, city schools find themselves in a dilemna as they have already completed their admission process for the year. However the government has agreed that these schools need not comply with the clause if they can prove that their admission procedure was completed before April 12--the day the Supreme Court gave its verdict on implementation of the clause.

Sandeep Goenka, managing trustee of Billabong High International School, Juhu, said, "While the Supreme Court order says this rule must be implemented by the next academic year, the state government has made it compulsory this year itself when they are not even sure what is the exact definition of the term 'weaker section'. The government has to first give us proper guidelines to follow." Most schools have completed admission for the pre-primary section by mid-March and are worried that they will be forced to admit students from weaker sections in the higher classes.

Ramakant Pandey, principal of Bansidhar Agarwal Model School, Wadala, said, "The government can order schools to increase the student capacity of classrooms, but how do we increase the seating capacity of classrooms?." "Where their funding is involved, they (the government) never act on time. How can one depend on a government that is still unclear about many clauses under RTE?"

Most of the schools have already made arrangements to implement this clause from next academic year given the fact that the admission procedure for the current academic year is already complete. Natasha Mehta, principal of Euroschool in Navi Mumbai, said, "Our management has already discussed this clause with me but we can accommodate it only in the next academic year as our admission for this year was closed in March itself." She added that the school only considers transfer cases for admission to higher classes. "How else can we accommodate all the children?" she said.
 

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