SC directs private schools to reduce 20% fee
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ISLAMABAD: Supreme Court directed all private schools across the country charging more than Rs 2,000 per month fee to reduce it by 20 percent.
Moreover, the top court ordered, private schools to pay back half of the fee charged by them during the summer holidays, within two months.
A three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar heard a suo motu case against fee hikes by private schools.
During the course of proceedings, Auditor General submitted report before the bench stating that private schools were paying billions of rupees to their directors adding that Lahore Grammar School was paying 8.3 million as salary to its a director.
The chief justice remarked that private school intentionally show high expenditures just to hide their profits.
He said that we appreciate the report of AG and said that private schools were minting money from parents and himself became billionaires.
The bench in its interim order maintained that private schools however could increase 5 percent fee annually.
CJP remarked that the court was not bound by the decisions made by the high courts adding that the court would make a decision on its own on how much reduction was appropriate.
On September 17, the Supreme Court decided to club cases pertaining to private schools pending in high courts and the apex court.
Earlier this year, a full bench of the Sindh High Court had declared that increasing private schools’ tuition fee more than five per cent of the last fee schedule was illegal. The court had directed the schools to either refund the excess amount or adjust it in future fees within three months.
APP
