Some observations are always skipped, in a rush to take sides or to get to the conclusions, when it comes to any issue society faces. About the private school fiasco in Kashmir that hit the headlines last week, there are facets which need to be noted, no matter what one’s stance on the controversy may be. The two private schools in the Srinagar city were derecognized by the concerned authority, on the complaint filed by some parents, citing the ‘unreasonable fee hike’ as the reason.
To begin with, a school can not and therefore does not increase the fee mid-session, so that parents get a choice to decide if they want to continue with it or not. What do we do when we find anything in the market unaffordable? We do not buy it. In this case, the parents wanted to continue with these schools, but like other consumers, they hated the price hike. The observation here is the fact that these people did not move to another school and went out of the way to somehow make these schools not raise the fee is actually a compliment to these schools. Notwithstanding the problems these schools are facing, it is a wonderful feedback to the quality of education they provide, from the perspective of those members of the parent community, who actually went to complain. They love these schools the most. The schools should, in a way thank them, for publicly recognizing the fact that they want their children to continue at these institutes. It’d be great to see both parties settling it down amicably so that children’s education remains unaffected. The government needs to make sure that happens.
Another important worry that we all have, is the private teachers not earning as much as they deserve. Barring few schools, this is true. Again, without getting into its right & wrong, the observation here is that these teachers have a choice to discontinue their jobs at private schools and opt for a job that values their education, skills and immense contribution. Why don’t they do so, with some exceptions who manage to get into the government sector- where, by the way, they get complacent? They do not move out simply because there are almost no other options. In such a scenario, these teachers still find private schools to be a comparatively better option or may I say, the only option. That means in absence of this sector, they would be doing worse. So, the complaint of exploitation is a fact, but it is actually the absence of other options that have given rise to this exploitation. We can not bank upon the ‘God-fearing attitude’ of the school management in all the cases. Some are good, and others may just want to take advantage of this situation. Whose job is it to create other work options?
I’m aware that from the legal point of view the schools ought to be Not-for-profit organizations- be those aided or unaided. The surplus is to be reinvested into the school. That, however, is neither happening anywhere in India nor should it happen. If it really happens, our students would be left with a handful of private institutions and almost 90% of them will have to join government schools. Needless to talk about the condition and standards of government schools. Even the law has allowed the unaided schools to make profits in many ways: getting into them would be a digression here. The point here is if we have accepted them to be private entities who make a profit, it’s unfortunate but we can not command them to set up a fee as per our choice. This is a very unpopular truth but health is even more critical than education. We never demand that pharma companies should lower their prices. A person is about to die and his son can not demand a discount. This is even worse. However, there is no brouhaha about it. So, what am I trying to say here? Am I exonerating the schools and giving them the free hand. No. Who am I to allow or disallow them? All I’m trying to say is that it is their moral responsibility to keep their fee under check, as affordable as possible, and commensurate with the facilities they provide. In this regard, even the Private sSchool’s Association Chairman GN Var proposed that schools be categorized as per the range of amenities and other facilities they provide, and then if the fee is fixed by the authorities for each stratum, it would do justice to the schools as well as to those parents who want top facilities for their kids and would love to pay for it. After all India is a mixed economy. It’s the mix of socialism and capitalism, where private and public sector work in tandem.
In all the observations made above, it is the system- controlled by the government, that is the root of the problems. One officer cannot change it. The first observation was about the high fee in private schools. The government has the funds of billions to run its schools. It hires the qualified teachers. It pays them 10 times more than private schools do. Why can not it compete with the private schools in the standard/quality and compel them to reduce their fee? Why does it have to hide its dark side by using its constitutional power to lower the fee of the private schools? In the former scenario, the competition would have benefited the students and parents and the overall health of the education system. Why do we forget that it is the government’s responsibility to ensure every child has an access to quality education, not of the private players? The private sector, indeed, has a moral responsibility but the government has a legal compulsion too. Not only education but even the quality healthcare should be accessible to those who don’t have a penny in hand. I do not for a moment support exorbitant fee that some schools may charge, but we are getting it all wrong. The moment we feel someone is making a profit, we deem it wrong and direct all our anger towards him. There will always be edupreneurs who would provide good quality and there would always be parents who would want to pay a high fee to these. It’s the middle-class parents who would bear its brunt. The question remains: Whose responsibility is it to facilitate quality education to them: the government or the private sector? Please note that a system cannot rely on the moral responsibility alone. We always analyze at a microlevel. We need to look at the problems at the microlevel and then zero into it.