Lok Satta demands all-party meet On increase in school fees

The Lok Satta Party today demanded that the Government convene an all-party meeting to hammer out an acceptable solution to the problems parents are facing because of the steep hike in fees in private schools.

Talking to the media, party spokesmen V. Laxman Balaji said the 200-300 percent increase in schools fees had forced many families to run into debts. Even poor and middle class families have no alternative to sending their children to private schools because of Government failure in providing quality education in pubic sector institutions.

Mr. V. Vijayender Reddy, Mr. G. Raja Reddy and Mr. Mohd, Ishaq Khan, party leaders, took part in the media meet.

The Lok Satta also demanded that the Government put an end to the practice of allotting liquor shops to highest bidders. (Excise auctions are scheduled for May). Pointing out that some liquor shops fetched as much as Rs.2 crore each by way of license fees, the Lok Satta leaders said that the successful bidders promoted liquor sales through unauthorized outlets, also known as belt shops. When the matter was raised in the just concluded Assembly session, the Chief Minister repeated his old reply that his attention should be drawn if there were belt shops. The Government was not ashamed of implementing welfare schemes with revenue generated from liquor, which ruined the very people whom it wanted to help.

Commenting on the Assembly proceedings, the party regretted that members of both the Congress and the TDP chose to indulge in mutual recrimination and wasted precious time instead of engaging themselves in meaningful discussion. Although the Lok Satta Party President Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan explained how Andhra Pradesh stood at the bottom among southern States in the human development index, and how it lagged behind some of the Bimaru (Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh) States, considered economically backward, there was no discussion.