Students asked to pay hefty amount under free coaching!

SRINAGAR — The students who have been recommended to private coaching institutes under 10 percent reserved quota to get free coaching classes on Thursday complained that they were charged by the coaching centers allotted to them.

The decision to charge students selected under 10 percent reserved quota is in contradiction of the government claims that over 4000 students are getting free coaching classes in around 300 coaching centres.

Recently, the Directorate of School Education Kashmir (DSEK) recommended 4300 students to 300 coaching centres under 10 percent reserved quota. The students were recommended after thorough scrutiny of their documents that they belong to poor families.

The list of students was approved after the Directorate of School Education granted registration to over 300 coaching centres for one academic session. The registration was granted on basis of the inspection reports submitted by the district and zonal level teams from every district.

“But we are forced by our concerned coaching institutes to pay more than Rs. 10,000 as fees. They told us clearly that they will not abide by the orders issued by the DSEK. We are in a dilemma, don’t know whether we are supposed to continue our coaching or not,” said a group of students.

They said they cannot afford paying Rs 10,000 or Rs 15,000 for their coaching owing to the meager income of their parents.

“Earlier, we were asked to pay heating charges by the coaching centres which was agreed by the students because the amount was around Rs 2000 to Rs 3000 but now they want us to pay more than Rs 15000 which is unaffordable,” the students said.

They urged the DSEK to intervene into the matter and get the clarity of the order issued by the department regarding 10 percent reserved quota at private coaching centres.

Director School Education Kashmir (DSEK) Muhammad Younis Malik didn’t respond to repeated calls made to him.