UT must pay for EWS students’ books & uniforms: Pvt schools

Communicating their concerns over reimbursement to District Education Officer (DEO) Ram Kumar today,the Independent Schools Association (ISA) noted that the schools want the government to notify the amount of reimbursement.

H S Mamik said,“We have communicated to the Administration that we will admit students under RTE only once the Administration notifies the reimbursement to be paid,including the per-child-expenditure and the cost incurred on purchase of books and uniforms. The DEO has assured us that they will pay us for the books and uniforms in accordance with our expense levels.”

The Department is,however,however, yet to finalise the per-child-expenditure to be reimbursed to schools and the time of payment. ISA has estimated the amount to range between Rs 2,500 and Rs 3,000. It has also asked the Administration to pay the entire amount at the beginning of the session.

When contacted,Ram Kumar said,“We have discussed the key issues with them. We are in the process of finalising the reimbursement procedure. The Accounts Department will finalise the per-child-expenditure after a discussion with ISA representatives.”

During the meeting today,the DEO also asked the ISA representatives to provide by February 15 the number of applications received for about 3,000 seats reserved across the 73 private schools. The ISA requested the DEO to notify the reimbursements by February 16 and allow the schools to convert the unclaimed RTE seats to general category ones.