Delhi: Govt tells schools to put nursery process on hold

The Directorate of Education (DOE) and private schools seem to be headed for a face-off as the institutes have decided to go ahead with nursery admissions despite the government asking them to hold the process till the matter is heard in Supreme Court.

The Directorate of Education (DOE) and private schools seem to be headed for a face-off as the institutes have decided to go ahead with nursery admissions despite the government asking them to hold the process till the matter is heard in Supreme Court.

A number of schools plan to start their admission process from Saturday. The list includes Springdales School, Indian School and KR Mangalam World School among others.

The directorate wrote to the schools on Thursday. “As the honourable Supreme Court is on vacation till January 5, 2015, and the matter will come up for hearing after the winter vacations, it is, hereby, informed that the private recognized schools may not initiate and may not go ahead with the admission process in the entry level classes for the academic session 2015-16 till the matter is decided by the Supreme Court so as not to prejudice the outcome of said special leave petition,” the letter states.

The schools countered. “The matter was decided by the single bench in the high court as well as the division bench. The directorate did not get any relief from either of these. We were allowed to go ahead with our process. This note that the directorate has sent actually tantamounts to contempt of court. Why should be stop? It is just because they have decided to appeal the high court decision? This is not acceptable to us,” said SK Bhattacharya, president, action committee.

Other schools too have decided to go ahead with their plans.

It is, however, the parents who are having a tough time.

“A number of parents have contacted us. They just want a common schedule so that they don’t have to run around,” said Virender Singh, president, Jagrook Parents Association.

Others predict that this admission season will be worse than last year’s.

“The situation is very bad this time around and no one knows what is going on. Parents are a confused lot,” said Sumit Vohra, founder, admissionnursery.com.

Last year, the sale of forms had started on January 15. In the last five years, schools have not started their admission process this early. ‘I don’t understand what is their hurry? For the past so many years, the admission process has started in the first week of January. Why are schools creating a panic this time around? The school session will start only in April,” said Khagesh Jha, member, social jurist, an NGO that filed a petition against schools setting their own nursery admission guidelines.