Mumbai Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Ashish Shelar has demanded a Special Investigation Team (SIT) probe into the issue of unauthorised schools in the state. Mumbai has the maximum number of such schools, the MLA said on Friday.
“Looking at the number of unauthorised schools all around, one is bound to wonder if there is any racket that is functioning in this sector. Hence, an SIT must be set up and a thorough inquiry should be conducted into the large number of unauthorised schools,” Shelar said during question hour at the Maharashtra Assembly on Friday.
Nearly 800 schools are unauthorised
An inspection by the education department in the state revealed that nearly 800 schools were declared unauthorised because of having submitted false documents, according to Shelar. A starred question in this regard was raised during the question hour.
However, while responding to this, minister of school education Deepak Kesarkar said 661 private schools have been found to be unauthorised and the government has initiated action, including imposition of fine and initiation of criminal proceedings against these schools.
When Shelar inquired about the criteria for declaring a school unauthorised, the minister said non-processing of documents is a major reason.
Shelar asked whether there was any racket functioning and said it must be thoroughly investigated by forming an SIT, following which Kesarkar agreed to conduct a high-level inquiry into the matter.
Introduce Signal Schools
The BJP leader also asked the state government to introduce more Signal Schools for out-of-school children on the lines of the Signal School in Thane.
The school education minister responded that the government has brought 9,004 out of the 9,305 out-of-school children identified in the state in 2022-23 into the mainstream of education. He also said that, in line with a government decision of June 30, 2022, a campaign called ‘Mission Zero Drop Out’ was conducted, between June 5 to June 20 this year, to bring all the out-of-school and migrant children in the mainstream of education.
