BENGALURU: Poor rate of admission in government-run schools and high annual refunds paid to private schools under Right To Education (RTE) has forced the department of primary and secondary education to propose amendments to the RTE Act. The department has proposed the Kerala model in which priority will be given to government-run schools to fill seats under RTE rather than private unaided schools.
“The Kerala model gives top priority to filling seats in government-run schools, next come aided schools and third priority is to private unaided schools,” explained a senior official from the department. The official confirmed sending the proposal to the state government to be placed before the next cabinet meeting for approval.
Officials said there were two main reasons for this proposal to amend the rules: Seats remaining vacant in government-run schools as parents of children, under the RTE rules, preferred sending them to private schools rather than government-run schools; and the financial burden on the state government in refunding the cost to private unaided schools which spend on kids admitted under the RTE quota. “RTE refund is a burden of Rs 1,200 crore every year for the state government. Not just that, this is impacting admissions in government schools, which is drastically going down since the last three years,” said a senior official.
“It is also a fact that the state government is helping some private schools sustain as they are getting admissions only because of the RTE Act where kids are getting admission under the 25% reservation quota,” said the official.
Meanwhile, poor infrastructure in government schools is also being blamed for the poor rate of admissions. One education expert said on condition of anonymity, “One can’t blame the RTE Act. The face of government schools will not change by abolishing or amending the RTE Act.”
However, education expert V P Niranjanaradhya said, “There were some errors in the implementation (of the RTE Act) itself and bringing amendments to the rules is the best way to correct it. As per Section 3 of the Act, it is a must to admit kids in neighbourhood schools, but it is being violated. Despite a government or aided school being there in the neighbourhood, kids are getting admissions at unaided private schools far away.”