Tuition centres

Tuition centres are private institutions that take tuition of students of all categories against payment. Initially tuition centres were confined to one or two teachers holding tuition classes in their homes and the students in their localities would come to the classes and pay fees. As the activity widened and good money began to flow in, entrepreneurs came together, formed sort of a syndicate, and raised tuition centres by renting large accommodation and turning these centres into academies. With the passage of time they became big money-minting factories because the fees charged were arbitrary and facilities that should be there were not the concern of the owners of these centres. As these centres could manage things by using political influence the politicians also showed interest in them and even in some cases became partners to amass big wealth. Obviously, these Centres while serving the society in the area of education, led to aberration in social structure because only rich people could send their wards to these centres to receive private tuition against heavy payment. Wards of financially weaker parents could not afford the facility.
Obviously, the Government is within its right to ensure that social aberration is prevented and society is not divided. More importantly, the poorer and weaker sections of society have to be given support and opportunity of becoming shareholders of development. On that spirit, the State Government has formulated policy to exercise control on the tuition centres and ensure that these function in a just and equitable manner. First of all the Government has decided about the uniformity in admissions, tuition fees, admission charges and facilities provided to the students in terms of proper infrastructure, accommodation, adequate availability of faculty, quality of faculty, class schedule, refund of fees and other charges and maintenance and submission of record to the Competent Authority. The maximum number of students admitted to tuition centre will be 150 provided the infrastructure and work force handling the Centre is reasonably adequate. Above all, each tuition centre is required to make 10 per cent reservation for BPL students and destitute and their details are to be submitted to the Competent Authority. The Director of School Education is designated as the Competent Authority to whom the owners of the tuition centres will submit annual reports of performance and other details. There will be time limit for refund of tuition fee in case a student wants to leave the centre within seven days of his admission. Refund has to be made within ten days of application. The tuition centres have to notify every change in teaching faculty or class schedule a week in advance and publish summary result at the end of the each session while sending detailed results with names to the Competent Authority. There are many more conditions that these centres are required to fulfill if they want to run the institutions.
This entire story has two aspects. First is Government’s intervention in the management and functioning of these Centres. It is a fact that the centres worked arbitrarily; they charged tuition fees arbitrarily, and they did not look to the comfort and essential infrastructural requirements of the Centres. They made pretext to delay refund of money even in genuine cases, and these institutions were influencing the social structure. Therefore, the Government did the right thing of tightening the noose round their necks and containing them and bringing them within the ambit of the rule of law.
However, there is another side of the story. Firstly, under the constitution, every individual or group of individuals has the right to run a private enterprise, manage it in best possible way and thus contribute to the growth of the society. Their right of enterprise has to be recognized. Secondly, the Government has made sweeping laws, which virtually reduce the tuition centres to non-entity. All powers have been concentrated in the Competent Authority. Concentration of powers is a dangerous thing and our society has been fighting against it.
Lastly and more importantly, the Government has devised stringent regulations to control each aspect of a tuition centre. However, it has not revisited the functioning of its own educational institutions, which are almost sick by the standard it expects from tuition centres. In terms of infrastructure, so many schools in our state hold classes in open under a tree owing to absence of school building. How many Government schools are there that are abysmally short of teachers? How many Government schools are there that have shown hardly ten per cent of students passing the examination to go to higher classes. How many schools are there where the attendance of teachers remains hardly 20 per cent in overall reckoning? Why would not the Government apply the norms set forth for private tuition to the Government institutions? If we go by the standards set forth for tuition centres, we shall find that not even fifty per cent of Government schools and institutions meet that standard. How then can it expect the private tuition centres to be abject slaves to the diktat of the Education Department. We welcome reforms and changes but these have to be just, equitable and viable.

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