Panel to examine fee hike by unaided private schools

 By Haryananewswire

CHANDIGARH, July 18

The Punjab and Haryana High Court is, through a 3-member State level committee, getting assessed  the reasonableness of fee hiked by recognized unaided private schools in Haryana.

While stating this here today, a spokesman of Haryana School education Department said that such schools included even those affiliated to Central Board of Secondary Education and  Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (ICSE).

He said that the committee has sent a questionnaire   to  District Education Officers (DEOs) of the entire State with the directions to forward the same to all the concerned schools to seek  financial details of the concerned schools for the years 2012-13 and 12013-14.

The committee has been constituted   by the  Punjab and Haryana High Court in Civil Writ Petitions No.20545 of the year 2009, 5587 and 3834 of the year 2010.

He said that the concerned schools have also been   directed to obtain the questionnaire from their respective District Education Officer  and submit the required financial details by July 31, 2013 to the Chairperson of the Committee namely  Justice Kiran Anand Lal (Retd.), 461, Swastik Vihar, Patiala Road, Zirakpur. The other two members of the committee are Sanjay Mehtani, Charted Accountant and   Nisha Sharma, District Education Officer, Ambala (Retd.).

He made it clear that as the matter pertained to implementation of the directions of the  Punjab and Haryana High Court given in   court case, any default on the part of schools is likely to make them answerable to the court.

He said that that the committee has, in a written communication addressed to all District Education Officers in the State, also asked them  to send a list of all   private recognized unaided schools under their respective jurisdiction and  urged them  to call upon all such schools to send the information asked for in the said questionnaire regarding the fee structure to find out the hike , if any, in the fee for the Sessions 2012-13 and 2013-14 within 15 days of the receipt of the communication to them. The DEOs would   forward the same to the committee within 15 days thereafter.

He said that  to fix the bench mark of the fee for the session 2011- 12, the information to be provided  by the schools  would include annual fee charged from a student of each class for the academic session 2011-12; admission or registration fee charged from a student of each class for the academic session 2011-12 and any other mandatory annual fund or charges realized per student of each class for the academic year 2011-2012.

The DEOs have also been asked to ensure that each such school be   asked to inform the date of submission  of the accounts or records for the academic session 2012- 13 to the authorities like Boards or Regulatory Authorities, and the specific authority like Board or Regulatory Authority to which the aforesaid records were sent.

The Committee would   ask the concerned authorities   to furnish the records received by them from each school, but aforesaid information being asked   from the schools would facilitate the authorities to trace the records, he added.