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| Kathmandu, Tuesday April 30, 2002 Baishakh 17, 2059. |
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Utterly ridiculous
This refers to news stories published last
week in various newspapers, including TKP, about the decision taken by the Ministry of
Education on schools’ admission and tuition fees.
The government has set up a committee which
is visiting private schools to punish those schools, if found collecting admission fees. A
few members of this committee have even pledged to initiate proper action against those
found collecting admission fees. Nevertheless, this was the decision taken by the Maoist
student wing last year in order to discourage the commercialisation of education. The
Maoist student wing even vandalized several private schools with the full knowledge of
this government. I want to highlight two aspects in this regard. First, the recently
enacted Education Bill clearly underlines that "the private schools must register
themselves either under the Company Act or Trust". There are other provisions for
land, buildings, and other physical requirements that every private school has to meet
them before they are registered. Obviously, to register under the Company Act is to
generate profit and pay tax to the government. However, the trust-run schools may remain
out of the tax net. Besides, the Education Act mentions that no private schools will be
regulated so mercilessly in order to prevent them from collecting admission and tuition
fees.
How can this government prepare such
contradictory policies against the private schools? Can this government back the Maoist
decision? The way this government is stumbling on the Maoist problem shows that it has no
clear-cut policy towards education. A government without clear-cut policy is a government
without mission. First, this country lost carpet, garment and pashmina industries. Now, a
few private schools, which are providing better education than government owned schools,
have become the target, simply because they have done well. This is utterly ridiculous!
Deepak Verma
Anamnagar, Kathmandu |
