TRS Not Serious In Regulating Private School Fee: Congress

Former minister Mohammed Ali Shabbir alleged that the TRS government was not serious in regulating the "exorbitant" fees being collected by the private educational institutions in the state.

"The decision taken by the Telangana cabinet to constitute a Cabinet Sub-Committee and then draft a new law to regulate fees in private educational institutions is proof that it has failed to prevent the looting by private schools and colleges in the last seven years. It also means that the Admission and Fee Regulatory Committee constituted by the state government was a farce and could not stop extortions of huge amounts by private schools and colleges," Shabbir Ali alleged.

Shabbir Ali said that it would take at least six to eight months for the submission of a report by the Cabinet Sub-Committee and the passing of a law in the state legislature.

Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao would thus ensure that the fee regulation got delayed until the next academic year, giving one more year to the private institutions to extort money from the poor parents.

"The TRS government came to power in 2014 on the promise of giving KG-to-PG free education. But it did nothing to fulfil the promise. All that happened was that the number of residential schools, originally started during the Congress regime, was increased, and hype was created as if all students were studying in them, while in reality only 10.9% of the students are studying in those schools, which do not have any proper infrastructure or facilities," he said.

He said that the TRS government's loyalty to private schools was also demonstrated in the shutting down of several government schools, and not filling the teacher vacancies or upgrading the infrastructure.

Also, though the "drama" of fee regulation was enacted before the beginning of the academic year, no action was ever taken against any schools for their "extortion", he claimed.

Since the Assembly elections were coming closer, now the TRS government wanted to enact a new drama of bringing a new legislation, he said. He pointed out that a similar legislation by the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh government had however hit a legal road block, and said that the TRS government couldn't be unaware of that.

"Why is a separate law needed to regulate the fee in private schools, anyway? The previous Congress regime had regulated the fee by just issuing a GO," he asked.

Shabbir Ali demanded that the TRS government prove its honesty by implementing the proposed law from the coming academic year itself.