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After stringent objections from several private schools to a proposed scheme to offer free education from Class VI - Class XII to girls from single child families, the Central Board for Secondary Education has allowed them to offer the fee waiver from Class XI upwards
Private schools across the country have forced the Indian government to water down a proposed initiative to boost gender parity in education and improve the status of the girl child in India, thus curbing female foeticide and infanticide and improving a skewed countrywide child sex ratio.
Last year, the Human Resource Development ministry had announced a scheme
waiving fees from Class VI to XII for girl children from single child families. But a section of private educational institutions did not want to exempt girls from the fees for fear of losing revenue.
Now, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has now offered them a way out. In a circular issued on March 27, 2006 the CBSE has listed two sets of guidelines on the issue -- one for the government-run Kendriya Vidyalayas and the other for private schools.
The Kendriya Vidyalayas, according to the circular, will have to follow the government policy in toto but a concession has been granted to private institutions. "All the Kendriya Vidyalayas would continue to give fee waiver to single girl children (except meals and transportation fees) from Class VI to XII as per the scheme already introduced by the board," the CBSE said.
The same is not applicable to private players. "All private independent schools affiliated to the CBSE may also consider extending waiver of school fee (excluding meals and transportation fee) to single girl children studying in Classes IX to XII," the circular said.
This means the private schools have been exempted from the fee waiver scheme for three years - from Class VI to VIII.
The CBSE's earlier circular, issued on October 15, 2005 immediately after the ministry's announcement had asked all schools, regardless of their private or state-run status, to implement the scheme.
The circular is advisory in nature but all institutions are expected to follow it.
One of the main objectives behind the scheme is to improve the status of the girl child and women, particularly in view of rampant female foeticide in the affluent states of north India, such as Punjab, Haryana and Delhi.
Several private schools, however, showed little enthusiasm for this. Carmel Convent, a well-known school in the capital, filed a case in the Delhi High Court challenging the CBSE's circular. The note had directed all affiliated schools to "grant full waiver of fees, including tuition fee and all other fees under any head, except meals and transportation fee". The schools were to implement this latest by April 2006.
Carmel Convent argued that the girls' school stands to lose around Rs 20 lakh a year because of the scheme. The fee waiver, the school underscored, doesn't make any differentiation based on the girls' economic criteria.
The CBSE then backtracked and issued the second circular that gave some relief to private schools. The Delhi High Court later dismissed the case.
Source: The Telegraph, April 16, 2006
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