As many as 880 schools have not registered a single admission although students were allotted seats in the first round under RTE. While there were fewer applications and admissions this year, the Department of Public Instruction officials analysed the data and found that most were aided schools (856).
Around 39.41% of 2,172 aided schools saw no student enrolment. The number is lower in unaided schools where 10.95% of 219 unaided schools saw no takers for RTE seats.
The department carried out the analysis after it found that admissions were completed for only 48% of the 7,636 seats allotted. Officials, however, are not surprised by these trends. “This is the result of the new rules that mandate that a child can be admitted to a private school under the quota only if there is no government or aided school in the locality,” said an official. The move had drawn flak from parents, who were hoping to admit their children into private schools.
“Despite this, we did an analysis as we wanted to know why seats that the parents had opted for were not taken. We found that parents did not opt for aided schools as they did not offer English medium,” the official said.
A majority have been allotted between one to five students under the quota. In some instances, officials also learnt that admissions made offline were not entered in the software, which showed a low demand for the seats. “However, these account for a very small percentage. We are in touch with the school managements and plan to rectify it,” the official added.
