ACCORDING to a national daily Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid has reiterated on Monday that the government would take legal action against private schools which will fail to return additional tuition and admission fees within the stipulated time which expired on Tuesday last. He gave the fresh call after a meeting with some representatives of 28 noted citizens who have earlier condemned the indiscriminate tuition fee hike and demanded discipline in this sector. Earlier last week the education minister issued a stern warning calling for refund of the fees and it appears that most leading schools have ignored it causing a stalemate in the situation. Those schools have hiked the tuition fees and the annual admission fees by 50 to 100 percent to cause severe unrest among guardians who took to the streets last month demanding scraping of the additional fees. The unruly situation started to develop in private school campuses following the implementation of the double rise in pay and allowance of the government servants. Obviously teachers of the private schools felt highly discriminated and that their existing salary is not enough to support the higher cost of living. The double pay rise of the government servants was not only a blunder but highly consequential decision on the private sector with its cascading impact on the economy as a whole. In this situation the salary rise by many private schools partly can’t be blamed but it can’t be accepted either because of its highly depressing effect on parents. The government pay hike has already agitated government college and public university teachers who shut the educational institutions last month demanding correction of the anomalies. Now private school teachers equally reacted to protect their interest at a time when nobody is taking into consideration the devastating impact of such pay and tuition hikes on the common people.In our view the government has committed the blunder and it has to resolve it. Threats to schools will not work, nor the maneuvering of private school managements will be acceptable taking the guardians hostage to build their resource base. They can’t justify soaring rise in tuition fees when they are already well paid. But it is clear that the government is at the root of the entire problem and it must find out the solution. Meanwhile we would also ask the government to take stern action to stop admission businesses in big private schools; which are reportedly realizing huge donations and forcing huge fees for various development activities. Educational institutions cannot be arbitrary in their relationship with the students.
