Yogi Adityanath comes to parents' rescue! Private schools can't increase fees on a whim

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday introduced an ordinance to put a cap on fees that a private school can charge in a year. The move will help students and prevent private schools from fleecing the parents. The ordinance Self-Finance Private school (Fee structure) Ordinance 2018 will be applicable in all the private schools affiliated with any of the Boards including ICSE, ISC, CBSE. Under the new bill, private schools will not be allowed to hike their fees more than 7-8 per cent per year. It also prevents schools from charging admission fee for up to class 12th.
 
The newly-introduced bill will apply to all private schools charging over Rs 20,000 in fees annually including the minority institutions. It will come into effect from the academic session 2018-2019. In case of non-compliance, the schools will face fine of Rs 1 lakh for first time violation and for second time the penalty would be Rs 5 lakh. If regulations are violated for the third time, the licence of schools will be cancelled.  
 
The ordinance stops private schools from charging admission fees every year. According to new regulations, admission fee can be charged only twice. First, at the time of admission and second, when the student clears class 10th. Not only this, the schools under new proposal cannot change the uniform for five years. Generally, it is the practice of private schools to bring in little bit of change in uniforms and syllabus to make money as they can only be bought from the schools' in-house stores.
 
After the new regulation, there will be only four types of fees: booklet fee, entrance fee, examination fee and joint annual fee. The fee structure will be divided into two categories. "The first is what the school can charge from students, including admission fees, exam fees, registration fees and annual fees. For all remaining heads, students will pay only for those services which they avail. It will be mandatory for schools to give receipt of all types of fees," Deputy Chief Minister Dinesh Sharma told News 18.
 
Ever since the BJP government took over in Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath has taken a slew of measures to improve education system in the state. Earlier, the UP Chief Minister directed the officials to take on cheating mafias and blacklist centres that facilitate mass copying during exams. He also directed the officials to register FIRs against government teachers who run private coaching institutions. In recently concluded board exams, the government had made mandatory for every school to conduct exams under CCTV watch.