?Delhi Government not paying enough heed to issues of budget private school

India's largest congregation of budget private schools, National Independent Schools Alliance (NISA) in collaboration with Coordination Committee of Public Schools (CCPS) and Delhi Independent Schools Alliance (DISA) had organized a press conference to raise the problems and policy challenges faced by budget private schools. This was a second attempt to highlight and re-emphasise the issues after the first big meeting with Delhi Education Minister, Manish Sisodia who had promised some concrete measures last September 2016.

RK Sharma, CCPS said, "Time and again we have been raising our problems but no concrete step has been taken so far. We had presented our charter of demands to the Delhi Education Minister, Manish Sisodia last September and have made available all the data and documents requested by him for resolving various issues by budget private schools. We have also formed a policy review committee and prepared a plan of action for the early childhood program and are looking forward to some tangible change in the current education scenario. Despite several reminders and seeking appointments with the education ministry, our voice has gone unheard. We demand a separate category to be made for budget private schools as we operate in a different ecosystem."

Kulbhushan Sharma, President, NISA said, "Our budget private schools constitute a large part of education system of India but the government has always been favoring government and elite schools. The policies drafted do not consider the plight and implications on low cost budget private schools. It is about time that government pays heed to our demands and ease the stringent policies, processes levied on us otherwise we will have to resort to media campaigns, strikes and demonstrations against the government."

Rajesh Malhotra, Representative of Delhi Chapter, DISA said, "Our schools have been facing huge difficulties in terms of opening and sustaining them despite imparting good quality education at an affordable cost. In our September conference, we had highlighted and demanded for a single window clearance system apart from the request to subsidize the commercial charges levied on power, water and property taxes but we have not been given any respite so far."

Chandrakant Singh, RTE Wing Chairman, CCPS said, "The current land norms recognition system for schools is faulty. These norms are only applicable to schools till class V and most of our private schools are unable to upgrade to middle and secondary level. Owing to such impractical norms, the EWS and even regular category of students drop out after class V and do not get education even to the basic minimum required level. Our remedy to the problem is to consider the built up area of schools (floor wise calculation) or number of classrooms and provision to allow schools to run middle classes in the second shift. The major emphasis should be on learning outcomes rather than on inputs and infrastructural norms."