Few proposals to open new high schools as State toughens norms

Registration, safety deposits hiked, land requirement changed

Very few proposals to open new high schools/sections have been received by the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) this academic year in the city, owing to the more stringent rules to start new schools issued in November last year.

Statistics obtained from the department show that a mere 135 proposals were received from Bengaluru Urban district for 2015-16. Out of this, 62 proposals came from Bengaluru North and 63 from Bengaluru South.

In fact in all the 19 educational districts in Bengaluru and Mysuru divisions under the DPI, it is the same trend. After Bengaluru Urban, Mysuru is the only district with some substantial number of proposals to start high schools/sections, at 19. Bengaluru Rural district sent only nine proposals. Dakshina Kannada sent eight proposals. In the rest of the districts, the number of proposals varies between one and nine, said an official.

“We received only 231 proposals from the 19 districts under the two divisions this year. The number is definitely much lesser compared to last year when it was above 500. Of the 231, 34 have fulfilled the criteria and have been approved, 122 have been rejected and 75 proposals are presently being considered,” the official said.

To prevent the mushrooming of schools with inadequate infrastructure and quality, the DPI revised the guidelines to open new schools in the State. The registration fees for starting high schools, both in English and Kannada mediums, was revised from Rs 10,000, to Rs 50,000 and Rs one lakh respectively. Schools also have to pay Rs 3 lakh for Kannada medium high schools and Rs 10 lakh for English medium high schools as safety deposits. For primary and secondary sections, different sets of fees and safety deposit amounts were prescribed. Another rule revised was for new schools to have at least half-an-acre of land within municipal limits, one-and-a-half acres of land in taluk headquarters and towns and two acres in rural areas.

V P Niranjan Aradhya, fellow, Centre for Child and the Law, National Law School of India University, said that lesser number of private high schools would help the government concentrate on providing universal secondary education to students under the Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan.

Child rights activist G Nagasimha Rao said, “It was a good move on the part of the government to bring in stricter rules for starting schools.

With lesser number of private schools to deal with, the government can concentrate all efforts on improving the situation in government schools where majority of the children study,” he said.

Official: We received only 231 proposals from the 19 districts under the Bengaluru-Mysuru divisions this year. The number is definitely much lesser compared to last year