Nagpur: The Assembly on Wednesday cleared a Bill to amend the Maharashtra Self-Financed Schools Act, 2012, allowing private companies to open schools. Currently, only trusts, registered societies, and government bodies can run self-financed schools.
The amendment introduced by Education Minister Vinod Tawde will allow companies registered under Section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013, to set up schools. It means that corporates who are registered as non-profit firms are only eligible.
The Congress and the NCP raised objections. “Primary education is not a business model, but responsibility of the government. While we promote privatisation, this kind of blatant privatisation will destroy the education system in the State,” Congress MLA Prithviraj Chavan said.
NCP MLA Ajit Pawar said, “What we can say from our experience in the previous government is that such move will create fake schools for the sake of profit. This may further spur the demand of seeking government bail-out package. It will ultimately force the then government to bear the brunt.”
The proposed amendment to Section 3 of the Act also reduces the space required to open a school in Mumbai to 500 square metres from 2,000, and in other areas, to one acre from two.
Mr. Tawde said, “We are only introducing one additional entity which can open self-financed schools. These companies will strictly be registered as non-profit firms, and therefore cannot open just to make money.”
