MP: 11 FIRs registered against schools, shop owners for illegally hiking fees, textbook prices

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According to a senior official on Monday, the Jabalpur district administration in Madhya Pradesh has filed 11 First Information Reports (FIRs) against school administrators and shop owners for allegedly inflating fees and textbook prices without permission. According to District Collector Deepak Saxena, these institutions unlawfully received Rs 81.3 crore in fees from pupils during the current academic year.

According to him, 11 schools have been fined Rs 22 lakh by the authorities. Superintendent of Police Aditya Pratap Singh stated that twenty people have been arrested in this case thus far. After discovering several inconsistencies between the school administrators and textbook retailers, the district administration took action, Saxena informed the media.

He claimed that some institutions raised tuition by more than 10 per cent without getting approval from the district office, according to the PTI report. A few others raised their costs by over 15 per cent without consulting the state government-appointed commission. According to him, these eleven schools raised tuition in the current term without according to the rules.

The district collector claimed that many schools had not released their audit reports, making it difficult to determine the precise amount of fees collected and the expenses incurred. According to him, there have been instances where a specific percentage of the total fees received have been moved for unclear reasons from one branch to another. According to him, parents ought to be able to purchase school supplies and textbooks from any store. According to him, schools are required to provide affidavits on this, but they did not.

According to him, the schools rotate their textbooks every year and assign more books for different subjects than what is necessary. He claimed there was documentary proof of a criminal financial conspiracy between these institutions and stores that sold stationery and textbooks. The official stated that many publications have a 70-100% margin, and the students who buy books do not receive this margin.

He cited the investigation in saying that the school administration lacks a person to investigate why they should replace the outdated textbooks, and that a specific management member unrelated to education is making the decision to stop using the outdated textbooks. The official claimed that increasing the quantity of books resulted in a rise in the weight of school backpacks, burdening parents with an additional Rs 40 crore. He said that false ISBN textbooks were also required to be bought by students.

(With Inputs from PTI)