Activists protest against St Vincent School conducting entrance testu00a0-- illegal under RTE Actu00a0-- and then admitting only select students without putting up the merit list

On Monday, activists belonging to the Students Federation of India (SFI) submitted a memorandum of demands to the deputy director of education and staged a protest outside St Vincent School in Camp claiming that it had given admissions to only select students, that too illegally.


Unfair: SFI protest outside the St. Vincent School in Camp.
Pic/Krunal Gosavi

Suresh Jain, president of SFI, said that he had received many complaints from parents that the school was giving admissions selectively ignoring meritorious students. "Firstly, the school conducted written entrance tests, which are illegal under the Right to Education (RTE) Act. Then instead of declaring the mark list and cut-off in a transparent manner, they put up only the list of selected students without declaring their marks. That's why our protest is against the illegal manner of admissions in this school," he said.

Sunil Magar, deputy director of education, Pune, agreed that written tests for admissions is banned under the RTE Act, but said that he would look at the memorandum and enquire with the school before coming to any conclusion. The school gates had been locked when MiD DAY reporter visited it and the security staff said the principal Andrew Fernandes was not present in school for comment.