Kamala Kanta Dash, BeyondHeadlines

A group of parents whose children have been denied admission to pre-primary classes in a number of private schools in Delhi through a Special Leave Petition (SLP) have approached the Supreme Court to intervene to ensure fair and inclusive practices in admissions. The petition filed by Snehasshish Mukherjee has been signed by Dr. Midhat Hussain, Tarique Akhtar, Syed Md. Talha, Masood Alam and Afroz Alam Sahil and the legal support has been provided by lawyers like Advocate Sarim Naved and  Political Activist  Adv. Adil Hasan.

The petition establishes how the private schools continue irrational admission policies for pre-primary school admissions which have led to a bias against children living in certain areas of the city which happen to have a high concentration of Muslim residents.

The petition complains that despite Muslims being 12 percent of Delhi’s population, the number of Muslim children being admitted to the nursery classes in these schools as a percentage of the total number of admissions is a mere 0.5 percent. It is indeed a matter of grave concern that while roughly one out of eight persons on the streets of Delhi is a Muslim, only one out of two hundred of the children admitted to pre-primary schools is a Muslim.

The petition has not only identified this practice as unfair and worrying in the context of children’s education, but in the context of a larger worry, that is leading to increasing ghettoization of Muslims in Delhi. The petitioners have gone further and have asserted that they now strongly believe that the attempts to marginalise students from the Muslim localities and from the Muslim Community in particular are nothing but deliberate. This is a dangerous situation of deliberate exclusion and the government and the Supreme Court need to take immediate steps to intervene and set it right.

Moreover, private schools cannot shy away from their responsibilities and cannot discriminate against students on the basis of their religion.  The action of private schools in discriminating against Muslim neighbourhoods and Muslim children does violate their fundamental rights of access to education. The applicants have requested the court to ensure a situation where admissions to private schools are carried out in a fair, transparent and inclusive manner.

Note: BH has a copy of this Special Leave Petition and the author has used the petition as the base to write this article.

(The author is Honorary Editor of Beyond Headlines and is working on the Engagement of the Muslim Community in Policy making in India and Australia for his PhD at Monash University. He can be reached at kamaljnu@gmail.com)

The Right to Education Act is discussed a lot but very few understand its provisions. There is overwhelming level of ignorance among politicians regarding the Act and its implications. Before I get into the nitty gritty of the subject, I wish to flag a few very relevant facts that should set the tone for the discussion on the RTE Act.

-  India has the largest illiterate population of any nation on earth.

- It is estimated that at least 35 million, and possibly as many as 60 million children aged 6-14 years are not in school.

- The country’s literacy rate has risen from 12% in 1947 to 75% in 2011- much below the world average literacy rate of 84%.

- The 2011 census indicated a 2001-2011 decadal growth of 9.2% which was slower than the growth in the previous decade.

- In 600,000 villages, the education of the young is in the hands of barely qualified ‘para teachers’

-According to experts, incompetent teaching staff is one of the main factors affecting literacy in India.

- It is estimated that there are over a lakh unrecognised schools in the country, maybe many more.  In the national capital, the number of unrecognised schools is estimated to be anything between 2500 to 10,000.

The data that I have given above was essentially to highlight the problems and issues that the RTE Act needed to address for fulfilling our founding fathers’ vision of universal literacy.  The RTE Act had two main objectives viz; a) guaranteeing right to free and compulsory education to all children and b) imparting quality education.  Has the Act provided the platform and impetus to fulfill these objectives?  Having closely scrutinized the Act as also the Supreme Court judgment on the issue, I have grave reservations regarding the key provisions in the Act.  The government has proposed a perfect but impossible solution to a burning problem-a formulation that is completely divorced from reality.  In passing such an Act it seems that the government has been afflicted by the Marie Antoinette syndrome.  Let me explain. During the critical food crisis in 1789 in France, when the then Queen Marie Antoinette was informed of the acute bread shortage in Paris, her laconic response was “Let them eat cake.”  Similarly, the various provisions in the RTE Act betray the government’s insensitivity and colossal ignorance of the facts on the ground.

The Act has enunciated a grand scheme whereby within 3 years only recognized institutions with certain minimum infrastructure will impart education in the country.  A laudable objective, no doubt, but impossible to achieve.  On the contrary, Sections 18 and 19 of the RTE Act if implemented would cause incalculable harm to primary education in the country.  The Act envisages that only schools that have the minimum teaching personnel and physical infrastructure that includes at least one classroom per teacher, a kitchen and playground, would henceforth be authorised to impart school education. At the present time when land prices have shot through the roof in cities, to conjure up a playground where there is none today is asking for the moon.  Quite clearly, the denizens in the Education Ministry are unaware or uncaring that the stringent stipulations in the Act will result in a large number of the unrecognised schools as also aided schools being closed down. In my view, the negative obsession to close down unrecognised schools before alternative avenues of primary education are available is an unpardonable crime.

It is apparent that in the government’s view, the unrecognised schools are an unmitigated evil.  It is estimated that out of the 6 lakh odd schools in the country, almost one-third are unrecognized.  What the government has conveniently forgotten is that since Independence, the unrecognized Schools have been filling in for the non-existent government schools. One commentator has attributed the rush for admission to unrecognised schools to the fact that standards in government schools are dismal, forcing parents to look for alternatives. The reality is that we have good and bad unrecognised schools in our midst.  The only fairly comprehensive study of unrecognised schools was done in Kerala some years ago.  According to this study in 2004 there were 2646 unrecognised schools in Kerala with about 3.5 lakh students.  The study arrived at the following assessment of unrecognized schools in Kerala;

“Most of the teachers are well-qualified and they impart good coaching to their students…Most of the schools…impart good education in every sense.  The school system provides employment to a large number of qualified unemployed persons as teaching and non-teaching staff.  The numbers of such unrecognised schools are increasing day by day.  As a result, numbers of students enrolled in aided schools are decreasing and it may affect the stability of the aided school system… Most of the teachers are well-qualified and impart good coaching…even though they are well qualified, they get very low salary.”  It is quite apparent that in Kerala, at least, the unrecognised schools are invaluable in imparting good education to the children, though; admittedly, the experience of other States could be quite different. However, what the RTE Act has done is to put all these organisations, the good and the bad, under threat.

As one who has experience of dealing with education department officials (my family runs a few schools in my hometown in UP),  I am deeply perturbed to see that the RTE Act, by giving absolute power to the Education Department and local bodies to make or mar unrecognised schools, will become the ideal tool for large-scale corruption.  Even when there was no specific law against unrecognised institutions, the school inspectors had to be ‘appeased’ even if the school had done nothing illegal.  Now with the RTE Act in force, the inspectors will have a free rein to force school authorities to do their bidding—a grim portent for the future.  I foresee a large number of undeserving schools getting recognition and a good number of meritorious schools closing down.

We must not forget that at present, between 35 million to 60 million children are not in school.  If the number of schools come down in number, as they certainly will, due to closure of unrecognised schools that do not comply with the stringent infrastructure standards, the nation’s goal of ensuring universal literacy would suffer a massive set back.  The RTE Act bases its formulations on the absurd premise that the recognized schools would not only be able to accommodate the students from schools that close down but also have room for the new entrants to school.  Can it get more absurd than this?  The consensus among experts is that government schools are generally not only overcrowded but impart a very poor standard of education.  Moreover, a recent study of 188 government run primary schools revealed that 59% of the schools had no drinking water facility and 89% no toilet facilities.  And yet ironically the government schools would be the most secure under the new dispensation envisaged in the RTE Act.

The most outrageous aspect of the RTE Act is that it treats select government schools as more equal than others, and seeks to insulate them from the upheavals triggered by implementation of the Act. By all accounts, the only government schools of a reasonable standard are the Kendriya Vidyalayas and the Navodaya Vidyalayas, which the Act has earmarked as the “specified category.” Significantly, vide section 5 , these schools are exempt  from accommodating children who seek transfer  from schools which have no provision for completion of elementary education. An Act that professes to strike a blow for egalitarianism and equal educational opportunities for all children has no business to accord preferential treatment to these schools.

According to the experts, inefficient teaching staff is one of the prime factors affecting literacy in India.  It may surprise you to know that the vital, life- moulding primary education in most of our 6 lakh odd villages is in the hands of barely educated ‘para teachers’.  The qualification for becoming a ‘para teacher’ or ‘contract’ teacher in most of the States is higher Secondary or even a Secondary pass, but in Rajasthan the qualification for the para teacher is 8th Standard for males and 5th standard for females.  What kind of education can such individuals impart?  Paradoxically, the RTE Act concentrates all attention on number of teachers per class and physical infrastructure buy pays scant regard to the most vital aspect of education, namely, quality of teaching. Significantly, the RTE Act in Section 7 (6  )  ( b )  blandly and generally states that the Central Government “shall develop and enforce standards for training  of teachers.”  The Act however, has, in Section 23, ratified “relaxation in the minimum qualification required for appointment as a teacher” for up to 5 years, whereas no such concession is granted in relation to physical infrastructure.  Clearly, the RTE Act accords little importance to teaching standards, which is the major shortcoming in our educational system.

The RTE Act is littered with utopian, unworkable statements of good intent. For instance, Section 4 directs that where a child is admitted to a class appropriate to his age, he shall, in order to be at par with others, have a right to receive special training. Section 8 commands the Government “ to ensure compulsory admission, attendance, and completion of elementary education by every child of the age of six to fourteen years.” Section 11 takes the cake and therefore deserves to be fully quoted: “With a view to prepare children above the age of three years for elementary education and to provide early childhood care and education for all children until they complete the age of six years, the appropriate government may make necessary arrangement for providing free pre-school education for such children.”  We do not have the wherewithal to provide primary education to all, and yet the Act envisages universal pre-school training facilities also being set up.

In the ultimate analysis, perhaps the only praiseworthy clause in the RTE Act is Section 12 which mandates that every recognised school, even if it is unaided, is obliged to admit in Class 1, to the extent of at least 25% of the strength of the class, children belonging to weaker sections and disadvantaged groups and provide them free and compulsory elementary education.

For too long has good education been a service that only the well to do can buy.  I do not accept the absurd elitist argument that the children from the weaker sections would be misfits or that they would pull down the overall standards.  In an unequal society, where quality education is available only in select schools that have been beyond the reach of the poor and which give their students a head start in all future professional pursuits, it is only appropriate that children from less privileged backgrounds are given exposure to such an education.  That’s what an egalitarian society is all about.  This is a small but important step towards breaking the citadels of privilege that many institutions have become in this country.  It is therefore heartening that the Supreme Court has upheld the constitutional validity of this proposition in the RTE Act. However, it is disappointing that the Court has also endorsed the impractical and potentially destructive provisions in the Act. There is also the big unanswered question of the fate of the children from the weaker sections after their free elementary education in the elite schools, where the monthly tuition fee would be equal to the annual income of their parents. What is their fate after they attain the age of 14 years? Your  guess is as good asthat of the  Education Ministry which has left this issue open-ended.

How will the implementation of the RTE Act impact the Muslim community which is educationally the most backward of all in the country? According to a survey conducted by the Social and Rural Research Institute, the share of Muslims in the out of school children is 13.05 % against the national average of 9.9%. Unfortunately, the RTE Act will only further widen the gap. At present, Muslims in the cities are mainly segregated in ghettos where, for reasons well-known, there is lack of basic services, especially schools provided by the government/ local authority. As such, Muslim children are largely educated in unrecognised schools that have mushroomed within the ghettos. For instance, there are over 30 unrecognised schools in Jamianagar alone and most of these schools do not possess the “minority school” certificate. While some of these schools may get the certificate, the others will have to shut down for failing to meet the exacting standards laid down. With the few government schools in the neighbourhood already overcrowded, I foresee a large number of Muslim children abandoning schools altogether or reverting to obscurantist madarsa education for want of an option.

(The author, a former civil servant, is Secretary General of Lok Janshakti Party and can be contacted on akhaliq2007@gmail.com)

The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) on Friday declared the results of the Civil Services 2011-12 examinations. Shena Aggarwal, an MBBS from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) became the topper. She did her MBBS from AIIMS and it was her third attempt this time.

The second ranker is Rukmani Riar, who has done Master of Arts (Social Entrepreneurship) from Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. She cleared the exam in her first attempt. The third position has been bagged by Prince Dhawan. He has done M Tech (Elect Engineering.) from IIT-Delhi. Prince cleared the examination in his first attempt itself.

While the first two positions have been taken by female candidates, the top 25 candidates include 19 male (including 01 visually challenged candidate) and 06 female candidates. In the top 100 candidates, there are 21 female candidates.

BeyondHeadlines also tried to collect all Muslim names from the UPSC result 2011 which has come today (4th May 2012).

It is pleasing that nearly 29 successful candidates are Muslims and of them in top hundreds are 4 candidates. According to this list of 910 candidates, 29 are Muslims which means that stands 3.18%.

Successful Muslim Candidates for UPSC Result-11

You can see the Result of UPSC on this link: http://www.upsc.gov.in/

BeyondHeadlines congratulates all the above candidates and wishes them the very best in all their future endeavors.

BH Global Education Team

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By Tairah Firdous

ENGINEERING, medicine and management may still be the most soughtafter career streams, but the law is the new flavour of the season — actually, it’s not that new: it emerged as a career of choice for young people who are not from legal families in the last ten years.

And the credit for this resurgence of interest must go to the corporate sector after the emergence of international corporations and foreign institutional investors as an important economic force in the country, and to the increasingly visible civil society. They have created an expanding market for law aspirants in fields as divergent intellectual property law, mergers and acquisitions, and human rights.

The legal sector has seen a paradigm shift in the last decade,” explains Raian Karanjawala of Karanjawala & Company, a renowned litigation law firm in the Capital.

More people are taking up law as a career, and right now, there are more people applying for legal jobs than we have vacancies to offer.” A law degree provides career options in different areas of expertise such as litigation, contracts and arbitration.

Within each category of law, there are sub- specialisations that offer a wide number of career choices.

Within the major areas such as corporate law, there are specialisations like corporate finance law, mergers and acquisitions, and insurance law. Students who are looking at law as a career option must also account for these specialisations,” says Karanjawala, whose firm was most recently engaged by Ratan Tata to argue his right to privacy case arising out the leaked Niira Radia tapes.

Though litigation still remains a time- tested career avenue, corporate law has emerged as one of the top choices because it offers both excitement and good remuneration.

Intellectual property law, investment law and real estate law are the other emerging fields.

Corporate law is a popular choice because of the opportunities it opens up,” says Rajiv Luthra of Luthra & Luthra Law Offices, a top- tier law firm that earned its spurs in the area power sector agreements.

“ The country has experienced a corporate boom and it has created many new career opportunities for young lawyers.” Another emerging area that is feeding legal practice is the regulation of services. “ Regulation of services such as telecom and electricity is a huge challenge and the area of regulatory practice is one of the most soughtafter careers openings among young lawyers,” says Karanjawala.

Globalisation might have come under strong criticism, but the country’s legal fraternity isn’t complaining.

Thanks to the process of globalisation, the services of lawyers specialising in international commercial arbitration, air, sea and surface transportation, and securities regulation are much sought after. The globalisation of the law has affected both international and country- specific regulations and the course of litigation across the world. Whether they serve multinational enterprises or seek to regulate their activities, law firms require minds that can grapple with the complexities of the globalisation of law.

“ Globalisation has opened up areas such as international regulation and global litigation, and the mushrooming of foreign law firms in the country has created a decent job market for lawyers,” explains Karanjawala. The world, literally, is opening up for young lawyers.

(This article was first published in Mail Today)

New Delhi: As the controversy about discrimination and low representation of Muslim kids in private schools of Delhi generates heat, activists with parents of students are planning to knock the door of Supreme Court against this discrimination and for implementation of recommendations of Ashok Ganguly Committee to make sure a transparent procedure of admissions.

Meanwhile social activist and General Secretary of Lok Janshakti Party Abdul Khaliq has written letters to Delhi Chief Minster Ms. Sheila Dikshit and repeated his demand to provide similar opportunity to Muslim students in private schools in the national capital region.

Khalid Hashmi, resident of Zakir Nagar, has applied in ten schools including Blue Bells School International, Birla Vidya Niketan, St. George School and Gyan Bharti School for admission of his child in Upper Kinder Garten (UKG) but he couldn’t succeed.

“They are biased and being Muslim it is hard to get a seat for my kid in any reputed private school in Delhi,” Hashmi, who works as a software engineer, told TCN.

“If you will not give similar facility to our kids then how can we come together to build a progressive society,” asks Hashmi, who has spent thousands of rupees and got around ten days leave from his office for admission of his child in UKG.

Ashok Ganguly, former chairman of Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), had introduced the point system in 2006 with an aim to bring in a heterogeneous classroom and promote a transparent system for student’s admission to school but later the Supreme Court stayed it.

Now Khaliq is planning to knock the door of the Supreme Court for fast hearing of the case.

“We are going to knock the Supreme Court’s door soon as we can’t see the discrimination against kids,” he says.

A national daily, The Hindu, published a survey in 18 March which says that out of 92 schools 20 (or their branches) admitted no Muslim child while 17 admitted only one Muslim child each.

According to the survey Springdales School’s Pusa Road branch has received 2,443 applications against 170 seats of which 155 were from Muslim children but the school has admitted only two Muslim children under the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) category.

Muslims comprise about 15 per cent of Delhi’s population but less than 0.5 per cent of Muslim children have been admitted.

East of Kailash based Delhi Public School received 2997 applications including 269 were from Muslims against 180 total number of seats. This school, which has many Muslims in neighbouring areas, admitted only five Muslim children.

The Kirti Nagar branch of Springdales School admitted no Muslim child while the school’s Dhaula Kuan branch admitted one Muslim child. In Blue Bells of Lajpat Nagar 150 children have been admitted but only two are Muslims and in Sadiq Nagar’s Indian School out of 120 only three are Muslim.

According to the report only Delhi Public School of Mathura Road has good record. It has admitted 65 Muslim children against 240 available seats, 23 and 42 in general and Economically Weaker Section respectively.

Cambridge School has given only 7 pints to the children of Zakir Nagar as neighbourhood points but the distance is less than 2 km only, whereas Friends Colony gets 10 points and Lajpat Nagar applicants are also given seven points.

TCN has tried to contact officials of Cambridge School in New Friends Colony but the administrative officer has refused to comment. “We don’t interact with media,” the admin officer said.

“I would fervently plead with you to direct your education department to critically verify the admission criteria adopted by private schools to determine if they are fair, just and reasonable. It is also important that all schools place on the web full details of their admission procedures, names and addresses of the applicants, names and addresses of those selected and the number of children admitted from different social groups,” Khaliq wrote to Ms Dikshit on March 6.

Earlier Khaliq has written a letter to, Kapil Sibal, minister of Human Resource Development, Salman Khurshid, minster of Minority Affairs and Wajahat Habibullah, chairman of the National Commission for Minorities in mid of March seeking their intervention in this issue.

“There are no reasons to believe that this policy developed after extensive consultation with various stakeholders allows schools to discriminate on the basis of caste, creed or religion,” he said in his letter.

National Commission for Minorities chairman Wajahat Habibullah responded the letter and told media that it is serious allegation and needs to be scrutinised.

“We have got a copy of the letter submitted to Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit on the issue and we will examine the matter. It appears as per the report that the minorities are not receiving the benefit of the various policies put in place for their welfare. It is a serious allegation and needs to be scrutinized,” he said.

According to Khaliq the data about the number of Muslim children admitted to nursery out of the total nursery admissions in private schools clearly demonstrates the systematic discrimination and exclusion faced by the Muslim community. It is clear that private schools discriminate not only on the basis of the social status of the aspirants but also on religious ground.

“There are clearly fundamental flaws in the admission procedures adopted by the private schools,” he further stated.

The matter was raised in the Rajya Sabha by Lok Janshakti Party President Ram Vilas Paswan and backed by Nationalist Congress Party General Secretary Tariq Anwar.

“Low representation of Muslim students in Delhi’s private schools is a serious issue and we have asked the government to take up the matter and have it examined. The fact that as many as 20 private schools in the capital have no Muslim student and over 17 have only one is something that has us worried,” Paswan said in Rajya Sabha.

“We want to register our strong protest against the ‘biased’ manner in which nursery admission seats are allotted in the capital. It is unacceptable that minorities are treated so shabbily here in the heart of the country,” Tariq Anwar added.

Hem Borker, a research scholar at University of Oxford has shared her experiences in a column on how the parents of Muslim community facing difficulties to educate their kids. Hem has worked in a fellowship program; the National Child Rights Research by a non-profit organization; Child Rights and You in 2009-10 and conducted a series of interviews with 20 Muslim families of Zakir Nagar.

According to Hem there were a single voice telling “We want schools that do not discriminate against our children.”

“Parents shared experiences of their children being “unnecessarily picked on, classified in front of their peers and harassed by teachers.” In many of the interviews, parents repeatedly made references to derogatory comments made by teachers on the eating and dressing habits (headscarf or extra-long skirts) of Muslim children,” she said.

(Abu Zafar is a Delhi based Freelance Journalist and can be reached at  abuzafar@journalist.com. This article was first published in TCN)

BH Global Education Team

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The CM of Delhi Smt. Sheila Dikshit, instead of ordering a probe, has chosen to defend the private schools on the issues of discrimination in school admissions in Delhi. In her recent letter in reply to Mr. Abdul Khaliq (Secretary General, Lok Janshakti Party, published on our site) she has argued that her government has done exceptional work in education. We at BH acknowledge the changing environment in school education and the improvements made during last few years. However, the CM has categorically avoided the question of discrimination against Muslim students in admission. We will continue to follow the developments. In the meantime Mr. Abdul Khaliq has written a letter reiterating the demand for thorough probe.

The letter is published below:

Dear Madam Sheila Dikshit Ji,

I gratefully acknowledge your letter dated 27/3/2012. Nobody has any doubt that under your stewardship, Delhi has made rapid progress in most sectors, including education.  However, possibly because I may not have articulated the problems clearly, key issues that I had raised regarding nursery admissions in private schools seem to have been overlooked in your reply.

Madam, one of the major concerns of Muslim parents in Delhi is the fact that their children are denied equal access to quality education which is available mainly in private schools.  You have taken umbrage at this statement and asserted that government schools also impart quality education.  I wish that was true, but the reality or at the very least the general perception is that most government schools are, at best, second rate.  Of course, there is no denying the fact that government schools on the whole are non-discriminatory in their admission policy.  However, the contentious issue is discrimination against Muslims in admission to private schools despite the fact that even such institutions come within the ambit of the legislation and rules enacted by your Government.

The educational backwardness of Muslims is seen by social scientists as one of the prime reasons for their alienation, their poverty and their marginalisation, for which the panacea is an inclusive education. Due to communalisation of the public space, however, Muslims are unable to access the opportunities ostensibly made available to them by progressive liberals like you. This leads to their continued isolation and ghettoisation. Most Muslim parents, who can just about afford it, regard modern secular education in schools with some reputation for quality, as the single most important safeguard for their children’s future.  Hence, their keenness to send their children to private schools of repute.  But that is not happening. Madam, I would like to draw your attention to an article titled “Shutting the school doors on the Muslim child” which appeared in The Hindu newspaper dated 5/4/12. Based on the detailed research conducted by the author on Muslim Identity and Education, the article lays bare the terrible discrimination faced by Muslim children in the field of education. I enclose a copy for your perusal.

You have stated in your letter that the current admission procedure in private schools allows them the liberty to devise their admission criteria within the laid down parameters based on the recommendations of the Ashok Ganguly Committee Report.  You go on to observe that there is no reason to believe that this policy allows schools to discriminate on the basis of caste, creed or religion.  While there is no doubt that the recommendations in the Ganguly Commission Report were very well thought out, the problem is that many private schools have so manipulated the admission criteria in a manner that it is in violation of the basic principles on which the Ganguly Committee made its recommendations.  To cite but one example; the Ganguly Committee had suggested 30 neighbourhood points for areas within three kms, but Cambridge school in New

Friends Colony has allotted only 7 points for residents of Zakir Nagar which is only one km away, clearly, with the intention of keeping out Muslim children who are concentrated there.  The Committee had also recommended that schools should include minority groups, socially disadvantaged sections and economically weaker sections and allot a maximum of 10 points to a child belonging to any of these categories.  This key recommendation has been ignored in so far as Muslim children are concerned.

The problem, as I see it, has got compounded due to the Supreme Court stay of the order of the Directorate of Education regarding admission criteria.  This has emboldened private schools to believe that they can do as they please.  The current self regulation regime is being thoroughly abused by the Managements of the private schools.  Madam, the Supreme Court stay certainly does not imply that the Schools can devise any criteria, however unjust, unfair and unreasonable.  Unfortunately, this is what is happening in many private schools today.

Madam, it is indeed gratifying to know that the State government is taking measures to promote Urdu as a subject in other than  the  17 government schools having Urdu as the medium of instruction.   One of the abiding tragedies of the country today is that Urdu, which represents the very best of a composite culture, has been reduced to a sectarian language meant only for Muslims.  That the language has suffered precipitate decline post 1947 is clear from the fact that at the time of Independence, Urdu was the language of the law courts along with English. Today, many schools offer optional courses in German, French, Spanish et al, but the so-called secular syllabus has no place for Urdu.  Meaningful promotion of Urdu is possible only if it is taught as an optional subject in schools across the city.

Madam, in conclusion, I would fervently plead with you to direct your education department to critically verify the admission criteria adopted by private schools to determine if they are fair, just and reasonable.  It is also important that all schools place on the web full details of their admission procedures, names and addresses of the applicants, names and addresses of those selected and the number of children admitted from different social groups. For this purpose unambiguous directions need to be issued to the recalcitrant institutions.

With best regards,

Yours faithfully

(Abdul Khaliq)

Copy to:- 

1. Shri Kapil Sibal , Honb’le Minister of Human Resource Development: for information & necessary action.
2. Shri Salman Khurshid, Hon’ble Minister of Minority Affairs: for information & necessary action.
3. Shri Wajahat Habibullah, Hon’ble Chairman, National Commission for Minorities: for information & necessary action.

Previous Story Link:

http://beyondheadlines.in/2012/04/cm-defends-private-schools-says-no-discrimination-in-admission-process/

http://beyondheadlines.in/2012/03/muslim-students-discriminated-in-delhis-private-school/

http://beyondheadlines.in/2012/03/discrimination-against-muslim-children/

New Delhi. Facts prove that Muslim students find it hard to get admission in private schools of Delhi but Delhi Chief Minister finds it hard to acknowledge that there is any Discrimination in admission procedure of private schools.

In reply to letter written by Mr. Abdul Khaliq (Secretary General, Lok Janshakti Party) complaining about denial of admissions to Muslim students by private schools, Delhi CM Shiela Dikshit has said that private schools follow directions as set by Ashok Ganguly Committee in admission process and there is no reason to believe that schools allow discrimination on basis of caste, creed or religion.

CM has also emphasized that the education standard of government schools in Delhi is raised significantly during last five years and there is focus on Urdu education as well.

Read full text of CM’s letter here…

Dear Abdul Khaliq Ji,

Please refer to your letter No. LJP/SG/1634 dated 17-03-2012. The importance of education in shaping the individual and society hardly needs to be emphasized. With respect to the issues raised in your letter regarding education in the capital city, I must state that the position and facts should be seen on a holistic basis so that correct conclusions are drawn.

Government of Delhi in the past few years has taken a series of concrete steps to raise the standard of education in its schools and it is no longer correct to say that quality education is imparted in private schools only. Increased enrolment in government schools in the last few of years and improved performance of the government schools stand testimony to this. Many of the government schools have been performing even better than private schools and data on pass percentage of last five years result of class X and XII proves this beyond all doubts. You will appreciate that achievement of government schools becomes more significant in view of the fact that admission in our schools is without any restrictions or conditions.

There has been an 18% improvement in result –from 80% in 2010 to 98.05% in 2011, of class-X in 17 government schools having Urdu as medium of instruction. GNCT of Delhi is not only focusing on government schools where Urdu is a medium of instruction but is also promoting Urdu as a subject by creating 109 new posts of Urdu teachers as against 264 Urdu teachers already working with the Directorate of Education.

I would like to point out that the liberty given to the private schools to devise their admission criteria within the laid down parameters for General Category seats is based on the recommendations of the Ashok Ganguly Committee Report. The Committee deliberated the issue in detail with all the stakeholders and made certain recommendations which formed the basis of current admission procedure. There are no reasons to believe that this policy developed after extensive consultation with various stakeholders allows schools to discriminate on the basis of caste, creed or religion.

Ministry of Human Resource Development, vide letter No. F. No. 1-15/2010-EE-4 dated 10-12-2010 with regard to admission guidelines, clarified that “The guideline does not specify any category nor does it lay down any cap on any category identified by a school. Schools are free to identify any category based on policy/principles that are fair, just and reasonable within the ambit of the RTE Act and the guidelines referred to above and placed in public domain for implementing the admissions in schools”.

The order of the Directorate of Education regarding admission procedure, dated 24-11-2007, wherein it was ordered that prior approval of Directorate of Education would be required for admission criteria has been stayed by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in SLP (C) No. CC 12744 & 12862/2007 vide Order dated 14-12-2007. Further, as per Right to Education Act, 2009 admission/screening test can not be conducted.

I would also like to add here that so far as admission to 25% of seats earmarked for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) is concerned, the admission criteria on the basis of points are not adopted. Admission is made strictly on neighborhood criteria by draw of lots wherever the applications are more than the number of seats. The Hon’ble High Court of Delhi in its judgment dated 31-01-2012 in W.P. (C) No. 636/2012 and  W.P. (C) No. 40/2012 prescribed guidelines for neighbourhood criteria for EWS admission. With respect to Economically Weaker Section students since the selection is based on draw of lots from the catchment area, there is no scope for any discrimination.

In every for a our Government has been encouraging children to come to schools specially those belonging to the minorities and there has been fairly remarkable improvement in enrolment. I understand it is nearly 16% as of now.

You should also know that our Government has recently enhanced the ceiling of family income for eligibility of merit scholarship for students from minority communities form 1.00 lac to 2.00 lac. Financial assistance for purchase of stationery to such students studying in primary section i.e class 1^st to 5^th has been increased @ 100/- per month. The financial assistance of 45/- to such students of classes 6^th to 8^th has been enhanced to 100/- per month and in respect of classes 9^th to 12^th from 75/- to 200/-. The merit scholarship has significantly been increased for students in class 11^th to 12^th, from 1620/- to 3000/- for students having secured 55% to 70% of marks and from 2040/- to 4500/- for students having secured marks above 70%.

As stated above we have shown impressive performance in school education. This Government is committed to ensure that educational facilities are provided to students irrespective of their caste, creed, religion or gender. Any concrete suggestion to further improve our school education, is most welcome.

With Regards,

Sheila Dikshit                   

Previous Story Link:

http://beyondheadlines.in/2012/03/muslim-students-discriminated-in-delhis-private-school/

http://beyondheadlines.in/2012/03/discrimination-against-muslim-children/