Mumbai: As SC suggests fee reduction, parents demand 50 per cent cut

With the second wave of Covid-19 raging in the country, online learning is expected to continue this year as well. Representation pic

As the country prepares itself for another year of online education, parents have started raising questions on why schools across the city were not following the Supreme Court's (SC) suggestion to reduce fees by 15 per cent. A group of parents has gone ahead and started an online petition seeking 50 per cent reduction in fees for the current academic year. More than 5,000 parents have already signed the petition.

Requesting anonymity, the principal of a Kandivli-based school said, "There cannot be a blanket suggestion like this because there are so many different types of schools. The entire fee issue started with those schools, which have high fee structures. But those who have affordable fees are struggling in this situation. Many such schools, like ours, already have an affordable fee structure, which was reduced further in the last academic year. Now it's difficult to give a further cut."

"Parents are constantly approaching us to know why the fee is not being reduced further. It will be impossible for us to run the school with a further reduction. I agree that the school premises are currently not being used but they have to be maintained. Virtual learning material too has additional costs," added another school principal from Andheri.

While schools are struggling to resolve parents' concerns over fees, Forum for Fairness in Education, an NGO helping parents in their fight against fees, started the online petition. The petition seeks 50 per cent reduction in school fees.

"This is in view of the fact that schools have not incurred expenses towards electricity, maintenance, laboratory and library use, water supply, sanitation, sports activities, staff, security and most importantly salaries of contractual teachers, as 70-80 per cent of them has either been removed or their contracts have not been renewed by schools," states the petition. President of the NGO, Jayant Jain, said, "The schools are also charging fees for services which are not currently used by students such as library fee, laboratory fee among all."

70
Percentage of contract teachers who have lost jobs