BENGALURU:The Karnataka State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (KSCPCR) has directed the officials of the state primary and secondary education department to withdraw the No Objection Certificate (NoC) issued to three schools of the Baldwin group in the city. The schools are Baldwin Co-education Extension High School, Rajarajeshwari Nagar, Baldwin Girls High School and Baldwin Boys High School located at Richmond Town.
This comes as a major relief to the parents of the students who had complained to the commission that the schools were quoting exorbitantly high prices for the textbooks. According to officials in the education department, withdrawing the NoC means the management will have no permission to run the schools. However, school management representatives were unavailable for comment.
Ashwatha Narayana Gowda, DDPI, Bengaluru South, said he is awaiting a copy of the order. “Once I get the order copy, I will send it to the government. Later, based on the government’s call, we will have to write to the ICSE Board seeking disaffiliation,” he said.
The Commission stated in the order, “In spite of the promises made by the Executive Director and Vice-Chairman of the school management to adhere to the Commission’s directions, the respondent school not only remained absent but had not followed any of the directions. On the contrary, the children who do not have books and whose parents are before the commission are mentally and physically harassed, thereby violating RTE (Right to Education) Act. The Commission is of the opinion that since the respondent school is violating and flouting norms of the RTE, the DDPI is directed to withdraw the No Objection Certificate issued to the respondent school immediately and inform the ICSE Board about it.”
Y Mariswamy, Member, KSCPCR, said, “The Commission is a constitutional, quasi -judicial body. Its order must be adhered to. In many instances, there have been appeals against the orders in the high court and the court has upheld our orders.”
A parent, speaking on the condition of anonymity said, “We fought on behalf of all parents sending children to private schools in the city as the issues are found in many educational institutions. This order will come as a relief and we welcome it.”
What was the trigger?
Parents had complained to the Commission that the school was quoting exorbitantly high prices for textbooks. Besides violating norms that mandate that schools display a list of books that parents should purchase and allow them to choose the vendor, the school insisted to buy books from a particular vendor.