Education Dept releases Rs 6 Cr for English schools

Aurangabad, March 5:

The Education Department of Zilla Parishad (ZP) started releasing pending tuition fees of students admitted in English schools on reserved seats of the Right to Education (RTE) Act.

A total of 25 per cent of seats are reserved in private English schools for economically and socially backward students under RTE. Nearly 45 crore fees of English schools of the district was not released for the past four years. Of them, the Government released Rs 6 crore for the district. But, this amount was not also given to the schools for the past four months.

The English schools of the district agitated and demonstrated many times to get released the fund. The Primary Education Department of ZP released 35 per cent of the pending fee of the academic year 2018-19.

Meanwhile, welcoming the decision, Maharashtra English Schools Association (MESA) president Prahlad Shinde said that there were four years pending fees with the Education Department of RTE admissions.

“The partial release of the fund will provide relief to the schools which are facing financial crisis for the past two years because of Covid crisis. Our Association staged agitations frequently to receive the fund,” he said.

Its city unit president Sunil Magar said that the cheques of fee refund were issued and around 35 per cent of the pending fee of the year 2018-19 would be deposited in the account by March 7.