Rajasthan HC to state government: Submit affidavit on quantum of school fees in Corona period

Jaipur, Oct 14 : The Rajasthan High Court on Wednesday lambasted the state government for deferring the fee submission issue for the last many months and asked them to submit an affidavit by October 19 which should specify the fee per cent that private schools should charge from parents during the pandemic times.

The High Court was hearing a joint appeal filed by the state government and advocate Sunil Samadaria on the private school fee issue.

The division bench of Chief Justice Indrajit Mahanti and CJ S.K. Sharma asked the state government to confirm how much fee should be fixed for the remaining session when schools reopen and barred the private schools to collect any kind of fee till October 20, which was adjudged as the next date for hearing.

As soon as the hearing started on Wednesday, the appellant advocate Sunil Samdariya placed a proposal and said that the court should set a 50 per cent fee for this academic session.

This amount shall not put any kind of pressure on parents and schools will not have to suffer losses.

However, advocate Kamlakar Sharma, representing schools, opposed his proposal and requested the court to listen to their plea on merit basis.

Hence, the court directed the state government to issue an affidavit so that fees amount can be fixed during Covid times.

On October 12, a joint hearing took place before the double bench of the court on the petitions filed by advocate Sunil Samadia, the state government and parents.

The court, after hearing all the parties, said that the fees will continue to be withheld till the next order.

Earlier the High Court ordered that 70 pc of the tuition fee be paid by parents.

However, as private schools were reportedly charging 70 per cent of the total fees and flouting the High Court order of charging 70 per cent of tuition fees in the current session, the All Rajasthan Parents Forum filed an appeal in the Rajasthan High Court, requesting it to defer its earlier order and to direct schools to claim only actual expenses while ignoring the additional expenses.

( With inputs from IANS )