Schools claim no information received yet on stay of fee hike in Hyderabad

HYDERABAD:  Days after the government and the Director and Commissioner of School Education }issued a circular stating that all schools in the city must maintain status quo in respect to the fee for the ensuing academic year, several parents have alleged that schools are going ahead with their earlier hiked fee structure on grounds that they have not received any communication from the government.After rejoicing over the government’s decision to put a stay on fee hike this year, several parents were in for a rude shock when schools told them that if they wanted to take an admission for their wards in their schools they would have to pay the increased fee. 

“My friend had to pay Rs 1.5 lakh as admission fee into prep 1 at DPS Nacharam. Not only was she given a receipt for this amount, she was also turned down when she enquired about the details of last year’s fee.
“They also told her they had not received any information from the government regarding not hike the fee,” said G Srilatha, a parent.

Like every other school in the city, DPS too increases its fee 5 per cent annually. Surprisingly, Srilatha’s son, a class VI student’s fee for the current academic year 2017-18 is Rs 90,000 while her friend had to pay Rs 1.5 lakh for a kindergarten admission. “I have not yet received a fee structure for the next academic year,” Srilalatha said. Epistemo Global School at Nallagandla, too has told parents that it has not received any communication from the government prohibiting them from raising the fees. 

“The school has jacked up the fees by 10-12 per cent this year. Parents have to pay `1.49 lakh as tuition fees and another `25,000 each for food and transportation which are optional,” said Sachin Bhutada, another parent. She added, “School claims that it has not received any notification yet   from the government.” Hyderabad Schools Parents Association said that it will wait for a few days before approaching the Director of School Education once again.

 “It has only been three days since the circular was issued. We expect the circular to reach the schools by Monday but if it doesn’t then we will think what to do,” said Sachin.Parents have also demanded that the Prof Tirupati Rao report should be made available to all stakeholders and be placed in the public domain to be accessed by all.  N Narayana, president of Telangana Parents Association on Saturday wrote to the Director of School Education G Kishan, requesting the same.