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FIR filed against Gurgaon school for expelling students who refused to pay increased fees
Parents of 6 students filed an FIR against Shalom Hills International School alleging that their daughters were expelled from the school. According to the parents, the school had struck off the names of 40 students from its rolls after they allegedly refused to pay the “increased fee.”
An FIR has been filed against Shalom Hills International School by parents of 6 students alleging that their daughters were expelled from the school. According to the parents, on May 1, the school had struck off the names of 40 students from its rolls after they allegedly refused to pay the "increased fee."
Anuj Chauhan, Ramphal Sheoran, Rajiv Chadda, Bharat Bhushan, Jyoti Dmebla and Jatinder Pal Singh filed the complaint against principal Atul Bhatt and administrative officer Ajay Pandey, at Sushant Lok police station for expulsion of their wards on illegal grounds and demanding money.
"There are only a few parents who have been defaming the school. In fact it is their dues which are pending since the beginning of the 2015-16 session. They have kept stalling the payments on the pretext of the ongoing audit," countered the principal. He added that the parents have also inflated the number of expelled students.
On Thursday morning, some parents sat on a protest on the Shalom Hills school campus against the alleged harassment of students. Following this, the school asked the district education officials (DEO) to intervene and look into the matter. "We have spoken to both the school and the parents and they have assured us that the matter will be sorted peacefully," said DEO, Premlata Yadav.
Meanwhile, AAP workers also visited the school on Wednesday, demanding an explaination from the school for the ongoing controversey. While parents claimed that they reached out to the political party through Twitter, school officials said that the situation was fuelled by political motives.
Interestingly, this incident has taken place within just a few days of the AAP government releasing full page ads which were splashed with headlines that schools in NCR had capitulated to government pressures to roll back fee hikes and had also withdrawn the pressure to buy books published by private publishers. In light of the general anti-school mood in Delhi, this move by parents comes hardly as a surprise. What remains to be seen is whether this will become a trend or remain, as what the school says, politically fuelled.