Parents to protest against fee hike in Kalyan school

Parents of students of Arya Gurukul in Kalyan will be going on a hunger strike on Friday, to protest against the school's fee hike. They allege that the annual fees were raised from Rs 11,400 to Rs 17,100 in September, halfway through the year. They claim that the management has even refused to meet them and discuss the issue. Bhavya Dore reports.

Parents of students of Arya Gurukul in Kalyan will be going on a hunger strike on Friday, to protest against the school's fee hike.

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Parents allege that the annual fees were raised from Rs 11,400 to Rs 17,100 in September, halfway through the year. They claim that the management has even refused to meet them and discuss the issue.

"They are not listening to us," said Arun Thete, whose two children study in Class 1 and Class 3 in the school.

"They have hiked the fee suddenly in the middle of the year, we want them to cancel the hike."

The parents also approached the Kolsewadi police station last month alleging that the school was threatening them and harassing the students.

"Last month, when we refused to pay the fees, they sent us a message saying 'please come and collect your child's transfer certificate'," said Arbind Prasad, parent of a Class 2 student.

In September, the Bombay High Court had ruled that the government could not regulate the fees of unaided private schools through administrative orders, but would have to come up with a law to be able to do so.

The school management said they had informed the parents about a possible hike in April and had made parents sign an undertaking that they would pay any hiked fees depending on what the court ruled.

"As an unaided school, our only source of income is school fees. We have to pay our teachers as per the sixth pay commission," said Bharat Malik, trustee of the school.

Malik said the school authorities had never harassed any students "We have had many meetings on the same matter, and we are still open to talk," said Malik.