On Friday, the teachers’ protests against the Bala Vidya Mandir management reached its fifth day with no concrete response to the teacher’s issues from the management.
The teachers, who had planned to start lessons for Class X and XII, abandoned their plans on Friday morning and sat in protest outside the school. “Our main demand is to reinstate Srinivasa Raghavan as principal and S.S. Nathan as CEO,” one of the teachers said, adding that they would not return to the classroom until the matter was sorted.
In the meanwhile, a few pre-KG students were the only ones who attended school on the second day after the official reopening.
The Private School Fee Fixation Committee inspection of the school is due to take place on June 11, with the preliminary hearing having taken place on Thursday. According to a senior official of the education department, the powers of the committee are restricted to making a recommendation to the CBSE to withdraw affiliation of the school as mandated by the Tamil Nadu Schools (Regulation of Collection of Fee) Act, 2009.
According to Section 7 of the Act, the fee committee has the power to verify whether the fee collected by the CBSE school is commensurate with the facilities provided by the school, to see if the fee proposed by the private school is justified and it does not amount to profiteering or charging of exorbitant fee and to hear complaints regarding the collection of excess fee.
Whoever contravenes the provision of the Act can face imprisonment up to seven years and a fine of up to Rs. 5000. “The students will also get a refund of their excess fees and all persons who were in charge at the time the offence was committed will be deemed guilty,” he said.
If the CBSE finds irregularities in the functioning of the school, it can take punitive action. The CBSE can even recommend reinstatement of the CEO and the principal if it finds they have been treated unfairly, the official added.
The Madras High Court in 2013, in the case of Kavi Bharathi Vidyalaya vs the Private School Fee Determination Committee, ruled that schools can charge an additional fee for extracurricular activities. “Charging an unjustifiably high additional fee over the years, however, would be a problem,” the official said.
The State education department also has the power to withdraw the school’s No Objection Certificate if they find a breach of trust.
If there are issues with the running of the society, in terms of misappropriation of funds and other violations of the society’s objective, the Registrar of Societies can cognisance of the issue. “It is possible to either dissolve the society or appoint a special officer to take care of operations as in the case of Annamalai University,” P.B. Prince Gajendra Babu, general secretary of the State Platform for Common School System, said.
The Private School Fee Fixation Committee inspection of the school is due to take place on June 11
