Parents in discussion with school authorities

VADODARA: A new row has surfaced in the city in connection to the admissions granted under the Right to Education (RTE) Act at schools running as minority institutes. On Saturday, the row surfaced after a group of parents approached a couple of schools including Basil School and Sabari Vidyalaya demanding that their wards be granted admissions in the school based on admit cards issued to them under the RTE Act.

But the school officials refused to entertain the requests on the grounds that in 2014, the Supreme Court had ruled that RTE Act will not be applicable to aided or unaided minority schools. While the parents of such wards are demanding that the schools should admit their kids as directed by the education officials, the school managements are stressing that the district education officials have erred while processing the applications under RTE Act.

“The SC order is very clear that minority schools cannot be obligated to reserve 25% seats for students under RTE,” said A M Mathew , secretary of Basil Trust , adding that the office of the Vadodara district education officer (DEO) too has not sent any intimation to the school regarding the admissions under RTE.

“If at all the admissions were to be granted under RTE, we should have been consulted before the process which has not been done. We have already admitted 180 students from senior KG to class one and it is humanly impossible for us to accommodate more students now,” he said, adding that the school will be approaching DEO on Monday. A similar situation has also cropped up at Sabari Vidyalaya where parents are insisting that the school admits their wards. Sources suggest that the school management had made attempts to approach DEO on Saturday but the official was not available.

Meanwhile, sources suggest that this year a total of 400 students have been granted admissions in 20 such schools which are running as minority schools.

An education department official told TOI that the schools were approached in the initial phase and asked to provide documents related to their minority status.

“The schools have provided us certificate issued by the board and not that issued by the director of primary education. Such schools will have to admit students who have been granted admissions under RTE,” said an official.

