Many private schools have sought the state government’s intervention to overcome a financial crisis they are facing because of parents’ unwillingness to pay their children’s fees for the third consecutive month (June).
Most private schools depend entirely on students’ fees to run the institutions, pay the teachers and other employees.
Many private schools affiliated to the ICSE, CBSE and Madhyamik boards have complained to the government that 60 to 80 per cent of the parents have not paid the fees for April and May and are reluctant to clear the dues even in June.
As a result, the schools have told the government that they are exposed to “severe financial constraints”, an official in the school education department said.
The owner of a middle-ranking ICSE school said he had to spend Rs 18 lakh every month on salaries. In April, the school received fees totalling Rs 4.5 lakh, which means the management had to spend Rs 13.5 lakh from its reserve fund to meet the deficit.
In May, the collection had further come down to Rs 3 lakh. “The June collection could be even lower,” he said.
Many schools have written to the state government that they have rolled back the enhanced fees which they had planned to implement from the 2020 academic session. They have also submitted compliance reports to the education department, which the government had asked for in April.
“…Private unaided schools by and large have given a compliance report to the respective District Inspector of Schools stating that we have rolled back our current year’s school fees to the level of the previous year i.e. 2019-2020…. In spite of the same, most of our Parents/Guardians are not paying fees…. It is now becoming humongous task for the management to meet up all expenditure and carry on the online lessons, which incurs additional cost if Parents /Guardians do not cooperate. Kindly look into the matter…” reads a letter written to the government by one of the schools.
After the lockdown was imposed on March 25, parents had complained to the government about their difficulties in paying fees because of salary cuts, job loss and the general slump in the economy.
On the basis of appeals by parents, the state government had directed the private schools in April not to implement the enhanced fees and also not to put “pressure” on guardians to pay the fees on time for the next few months.
Ranjan Mitter, the secretary of the Bengal chapter of the Association of Schools of Indian School Certificate, said several institutions were facing financial constraints.
“The schools have been forced to write to the government and seek its intervention,” said Mitter.