Pune: After a long wait, the State Education Department has finally released results of the second lottery for admissions under the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act. While 69,759 seats are still vacant in the State, 35,276 children have been allotted schools in the second lottery. The admissions in the second round would begin from Monday, June 17.
Much to the dismay of the activists and parents, less than 50 per cent of the childre allotted schools in the first lottery, have taken admissions at the end of the first round. Only 47,034 children have taken admissions across the State in the first round of admissions. 1,16,793 students were selected in the first list.
“The State government drew the second lottery for admissions under the RTE Act on Saturday. We selected 5,495 students in Pune for the second round,” Joint Director of Education Dinkar Temkar informed Sakal Times.
Admission process tedious
As Sakal Times had earlier reported, activists had expressed concern that many parents might not be able to understand the English text messages sent to the parents regarding school allotment.
“We have met so many parents who were unable to understand the messages sent to them. This might be one of the main reasons for the lower number of admissions this year,” said Pradnya Waghmare from Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Research and Training Institute (BARTI).
BARTI has helped a total of 5,020 children across the State in getting admissions under the RTE Act successfully this year.
As per RTE activist Mukund Kirdat, the difficulties in locating and taking the documents to the respective verification committees has made the process difficult for many parents and might be one of the reasons why the number of admissions is so less in the first round.
This year, for the first time, the Education Department has appointed committees to verify the parents’ documents before admissions. Earlier, the respective schools carried out this work.
“The parents have to select the educational block in which their area lies on the RTE website. Then, they have to select the committee online itself before going to it physically to get the documents verified. Locating the educational block might also be difficult for many. For instance, those from Warje area are a part of Aundh Block. This has made the process tedious for the parents,” Kirdat stated.
Activists asserted that considering that the parents, who come under the RTE Act, are from backward socio-economic classes, the process of admissions has to be kept simple.
Delay might lead to lower admissions rate
Kirdat said the delay in the admissions’ process this year might lead to lesser admissions, even lower than usual this year.
“Many of the schools, under the State Board as well as the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), have reopened for the new academic year. So, instead of waiting in anticipation, many parents will take admissions for their children as regular students, wherever possible,” he added.
“Firstly, the process itself has begun very late this time. Moreover, the gap between the first lottery and the next one was too long for the parents to wait. Even if the second and the third lotteries were released within a month from the first one, the picture could have been better,” Waghmare further said.
8K admissions
Out of the 18,061 children in Pune who had been allotted schools in the first RTE lottery, only 8,983 have taken admissions till date, according to the official website for the RTE admissions.
