Parents want regulation of school fees: Survey
New Delhi, July 3: A survey has found that 93 per cent parents want annual fees charged by the private schools to be a capped at one month of tution fee.
"Schools adopt various ways to hike the total fees. While the tuition fee may not be hiked, all other fees like annual/admission fee are raised indiscriminately by the schools. Hence, when asked whether this fee, under the head of annual or admission fee, should be limited to one month of tuition fee, 93 per cent of the citizens agreed," the survey by LocalCircles revealed.
For the survey, the LocalCircles community social media platform received over 58,000 responses from over 21,000 parents in 215 districts in the country.
The survey also focused on the ways to regulate school fee hikes, with the majority of parents (54 per cent of 13,317 votes) feeling that the percentage of hike should be linked to inflation.
One of the biggest arguments given by schools for raising fees is to enhance the quality of education or maintain it but in the polls, parents do not seem to be convinced of this line.
Almost 77 per cent of 7,205 parents say that capping of fees would not affect the quality of education.
In the survey, a majority of parents have also suggested that it should be made mandatory for all schools to publish their annual statement of costs on their website.
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'Godman' Kharat held in 8th sexual exploitation case; court denies police remand, sends him to jail
Nashik (PTI): Police took custody of self-proclaimed godman-cum-astrologer Ashok Kharat in an eighth case related to sexual exploitation of women and produced him before a Nashik district court which sent him to jail till May 12 after rejecting the plea for his police remand on Thursday.
On April 29, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the Nashik police in north Maharashtra filed a request application in the court demanding Kharat's custody in the eighth case.
After the court granted them the necessary permission, the SIT took custody of Kharat, who was in jail in connection with the seventh case of sexual exploitation registered against him.
The 'godman', named in a dozen FIRs related to rape and financial fraud, was produced before Chief Judicial Magistrate B N Ichpurani in the eighth case through video conferencing due to security reasons.
The eighth case related to Kharat allegedly sexually exploiting a woman who had approached him in search of solutions to her family problems, according to police.
During the hearing, the prosecution demanded police custody of the accused in the latest case.
However, the defence strongly opposed the demand and argued that the SIT was giving same reasons for police custody every time and there was no strong reason for accepting their plea.
The court accepted the argument put forth by the defence and remanded Kharat to judicial custody till May 12 in the eighth case.
The SIT will produce Kharat in the court on Friday again and seek his police custody in the ninth case. As the self-styled godman has been granted judicial custody in the eighth case, he will be sent to Nashik Road Central Jail and the SIT will take his custody from there.
Meanwhile, Kharat's judicial custody in the fourth case ended on Thursday. On April 18, the accused was remanded to judicial custody till April 30 in the fourth case of sexual exploitation of women.
In a related development, the SIT conducted a search at Kharat's office in the 'Canada Corner' area of Nashik city on Wednesday. A 'panchnama' (record of search and seizure proceedings) was conducted and the office was locked and sealed again.
Kharat, a well-heeled man with political connections, was arrested for the first time on March 18 after a woman alleged he had repeatedly raped her for three years.
He is accused of sexually exploiting several women by claiming to have divine powers and knowledge of black magic, and also committing large-scale financial fraud.
The SIT is conducting a probe into 12 cases of sexual exploitation and financial fraud registered against the astrologer in Nashik and Ahilyanagar districts.
