In a testimony to the increased awareness among parents about the Right to Education (RTE) Act, Bangalore Rural district received almost six times more RTE applications than the number of seats available.
According to statistics, as many as 6,267 RTE applications have been submitted by parents against the availability of 1,996 seats in RTE quota in kindergarten and class one.
The overwhelming response has forced the administration to give top priority to children falling under the neighbourhood concept. “We have decided to separate children who are outside the neighbourhood. Applications from within the neighbourhood will be considered and seats allotted through lottery,” said DDPI H V Venkateshappa, Bangalore Rural.
Against 977 kindergarten seats, the district received 2,446 applications. For 1,019 seats in class one, it received 3,821 applications.
To make the admission process easier, two nodal officers will be appointed for each school in the district. They will liaise with the DDPI and schools.
For 2013-14, more than 30,000 RTE seats have been identified in the districts of Bangalore North, South and Rural.
The status of RTE applications in Bangalore North and South are awaited as the respective BEOs are collating the numbers to arrive at an official figure.
As per the revised RTE calendar of events, the last date for schools to submit the admission list to BEOs is March 2 and the last date for BEOs to approve the list is March 11. The commencement of admission process starts from March 15.