By Abdul Shakoor Khan:
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“I am the symbolic father of 4000 children, and unless you waive off the fee of all of them I will not leave my just struggle to drag the school business mafia to court,” Mohammad Aslam Rind, former Nazim and famous social worker of the Quetta city said narrating his strives, he made against the private school mafia hounded parents with fee challans for holidays months against the court verdict.
“Against the uncontrolled private schools mainly the branded ones, relevant authorities seem helpless; to mend their ways, and take them to task, it is only parent’s headache to fight back such giant mafia minting money for their vested interest,”.
Aslam Rind told Quetta Voice that following the apex court’s verdict on the fee structure of the private schools in 2019; he started raising his voice on different forums. I held several meetings chaired by the then Deputy Commissioner Quetta Zafar Abbasi and the representatives of the private schools operating across the province but all in vain.
“My invincibility and inflexibility of very stance coerced private school body offer me waiving off fee of my children,” I have no children in any of the private schools, my struggle is for all children studying in private schools, I cleared to them turning down their offer and sticking to my only demand of getting maximum relief to all parents.
Despite the passage of three years, nothing changed, parents are compelled to deposit a major chunk of their hard-earned money in the banks of schools to equip their children with knowledge being sold out by the business mafia keen to hoard money and least interested in character building of the students.
The wave of inflation during the PTI regime has not only impacted the poor but the middle class as well. Parents have started recalculating and cutting monthly household expenses, while on the other hand rising fees in private educational institutions and other relevant expenses have forced them even change their children’s schools.
Though parents in droves moved the court and the Private Educational Institutions Registration and Regulatory Authority, not much difference was made.
Millions of parents reeling from the economic downturn across the country are worried about the private schools’ tendency to churn out cash from them in the name of quality education.
The price hike of the daily essentials has put parents between the devil and the deep sea. Hardly do they manage a monthly household edible and other budgets for other necessities, then they come across the unchecked and illegal fees charged by the private schools, sometimes two months at a time as well.
“How could you deprive students of taking annual exams, if parents did not pay double fee ie November-December,” Abdul Razaq Shaikh, a local journalist told his recent experience when his three kids studying in the missionary school were barred from sitting in the exam on the pretext of non-payment of their two months fee.
Shaikh further deplored that his three kids studying in the country’s big brand known for its welfare schooling system were barred from taking exams as he was late to deposit two months’ Nov-Dec fee.
“There is no check on them, how dare they could take two month’s fee at a time violating the laws and liable to contempt of court,” he said adding that to save his kids from an embarrassing situation, he took money from a friend of mine and deposited fee,”
Parliamentary Secretary of Law and Parliamentary Affairs, Dr. Rubaba Buledi commenting on the apathy of the private schools and helplessness of poor parents deplored that parliament has made the laws and formed the authority but implementation of these laws is not satisfactory.
“Government, through its different mechanisms, is striving hard to improve the quality of education in the government-run schools,” she said, adding that with improvement in the public schools, we can provide relief to the poor parents.
Long-term strategy and sustainable steps taken by the government aimed at bringing reforms in the education sector would help free parents from the brutal clutches of the private school mafia running their business in the name of imparting education.
