BENGALURU: If you are a student, teacher or a parent of a child admitted to a school in the state, the chances are that your personal information and that of the children may fall into the hands of a private company. The department of primary and secondary education has signed an agreement with a private company to provide information for digitisation of the education system in the state.
In the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed with SchoolGLink Pvt Ltd, the department has agreed to share personal details of students, parents, teachers from government-run and aided as well as private schools functioning in the state.The MoU reads: “All details, including name, contact number, address, email address of parents and teachers and also attendance details of teachers and students and marks of the students will be provided to the company for analysis.”
Department sources said that data of almost 2.5 lakh government and aided school teachers have already been shared with the private company. This alleged violation of rules has been objected to by some department officials. They have also shot off a letter to the government in this regard.“Sharing data with a private company is a clear violation of Information Technology Act, 2000. Section 72 of the Act clearly says sharing personal data without getting consent of the person is a violation of the Act.
This can lead to imprisonment for two years,” said a senior official of the department.However, the department mentions in the MoU that the objective of the partnership with the private company is to digitise the education system in the state and also allow stakeholders to download the mobile application SchooGLink or register on the website. Associated Managements of Primary and Secondary Schools in Karnataka is also mulling taking legal route against the decision.
General secretary D Shashikumar said, “The department is not allowed to share data and details of any of our teachers, parents or students. We have already received complaints of data being misused where people are getting marketing calls during late night. If this continues, we will approach the court and fight it legally.”When contacted, Shalini Rajneesh, principal secretary to the department of primary and secondary education, said that all these allegations are baseless. “The MoU is vetted by the law department. Privacy and confidentiality clauses as per the IT policy are fully in place,” she added.