A school in Vadodara city has been accused of segregating students from economically weaker sections, who were admitted under the Right To Education (RTE) quota, into a separate classroom, thereby preventing them from mixing with other students of the school.
According to the complaint submitted to the District Education Officer (DEO) by the parents of 38 students who were admitted under the RTE, the Bhartiya Vidya Bhavans administration has carved out a separate section, B1, for students of Class I.
The 38 students, belonging to the economically weaker sections, were admitted to the school after finishing their kindergarten from different schools.
The complaint states, “Students who have been admitted to the school under the RTE are allotted a separate classroom and are segregated from other students and discriminated against. We request you to look into the matter and absorb them with all the other students.”
According to the parents, their attempts to approach the school principal and the administrative authorities over the issue have been futile. “Every time we tried to meet the principal, we were asked to come later. When we approached the class teacher, she said that the students will continue to remain in a separate class till class 8,” one of the parents said.
Confirming the fact that the school has created a separate section for the students admitted under the RTE, school principal R K Singhal said, “We are not discriminating against them, but we have faced problems with the previous batches where the students were unable to cope with other students. So, we want to work with them separately and help them in whichever way we can so that they could excel.”
Meanwhile, the parents have also claimed that the students are not given due attention in the class. According to them, since the school reopened after summer vacation, the students hardly have any classwork or homework despite having missed a month’s academic schedule, since the regular classes begin before summer vacation, but the process of RTE admissions takes place later.
An education official at the DEO said, “CBSE schools commence their new academic year for a month before they break for summer vacation. Students under the RTE who have joined the classes now have missed the entire month’s curriculum and based on that Bhartiya Vidya Bhavans has created a separate section for these students. But we will soon be meeting school authorities and make sure that these students are not segregated like this and are absorbed with other students in different sections. This is for the first time that we have been approached for a situation like this and we will make sure that the issue is resolved.”