Starting Monday, 480 schools across the city will be closed as part of the state-wide bandh called by the Karnataka Unaided Schools Management Association (KUSMA). “We are not against RTE, but we are against this step-motherly treatment”, said the Association organizing secretary Mr A. Mariyappa. “All our schools will be closed”, he affirmed.
On his part Primary and Secondary Education minister Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri said, “The government has requested KUSMA not to close down schools. We are holding a meeting tomorrow to discuss the issue.”
Other organizations, including the Karnataka State Private Schools Management Federation and the Karnataka Federation of Independent Schools Management (KFISM), which have 284 CBSE and ICSE schools under its umbrella, said they will not be participating in the strike.
“The ICSE and CBSE schools will function normally”, said Mr Mansoor Ali Khan, trustee, Delhi Public School. The commissioner of the Department of Public Instruction, Mr Kumar Naik, will meet KUSMA representatives on Monday. But this decision has sparked outrage among other organisations like KSPSMF, who are irked at not being included in the decision-making.
“The Federation is not supporting the closure of schools tomorrow”, said Mr D. Shashi Kumar, organising secretary of the Federation. “We are backing the cause, but we don’t appreciate being excluded from the meeting tomorrow”, he said. “Our schools will function normally”, he added.
The decision to close schools was arrived at during a meeting called by KUSMA on June 24, to protest against the exclusion of minority institutions from the purview of RTE and to demand a fair definition of the term ‘minority’. The government’s consequent explanation said that only schools where 75% of the student body is from the minority communities will be excluded from the RTE.