Detailed judgment: PHC gives reasons for dismissing private educational institutions review petitions

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) has given the reasons for dismissing the review petitions filed by owners of private educational institutions against the high court decision and regulations of the Private Schools Regulatory Authority on the decrease in fee.

“The review petitions are dismissed not only being barred by time but no error apparent on the face of the record has been pointed out,” stated a detailed judgment of the Peshawar High Court (PHC) authored by Justice Nasir Mehfooz.

The review petitions were filed on the grounds that the owners of the private educational institutions were not unheard of in the high court decision and prayed the court to review its decision on the decrease in fee.

Abbas Khan Sangeen and Zahidullah Zahid appeared for the Peshawar Bar Association.

Syed Zahir Ali Shah, Managing Director of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Private Schools Regulatory Authority, appeared as respondents. He defended the high court decision and regulations in the review petitions of the owners of the private educational institutions.

In the judgment, the high court had ordered that the private educational institutions shall not charge more than half of the tuition fee from the second and third student of the same parents, the institutions shall charge maximum of 50 percent tuition fee during vacations and annual increase in admission under no circumstances be more than three percent.

The high court held in the detailed judgment that the regulations framed under the Act 2017 for private educational institutions consist of exhaustive guidelines for the functioning of private educational institutions.

However, the court stated that the provincial government had constituted Regulatory Authority for private educational institutions on August 18, 2017, but the authority was not performing its duties to regulate the private educational institutions.

About the court decision and actions for reducing the high fee, the court stated, “Indeed, courts could neither assumes the role of policymakers not that of the lawmakers, but it is very unfortunate that the authorities/regulatory authorities so constituted before 2001, and till date are not performing their duties up to the mark, rather there is a criminal negligence on their part, which resulted in establishing schools right from playgroup/primary level up to the university levels without having any proper building and other facilities including water supply, edibles, playgrounds, assembly halls and others.”

The court added in the judgment that all these private educational institutions/schools from playgroup to intermediate levels with the majority of 80 per cent are without the facilities above mentioned and are minting money at every step.

“The private educational institutions are charging the annual fee, tuition fee, library fee, laboratory fee, examination fee, answer book fee, result card fee, etc and that too during vacations when they are not providing services,” the court pointed out in judgment.

Furthermore, it said the teachers and other connected staff are laid off during the vacations in order to get away with the salaries of those employees.

“The detailed analysis of the impugned regulation reveals that comprehensive nature of provisions was included in the act, that was not previously provided and would certainly leave a positive effect on the performance of schools as well as the standard of education,” the court observed in the judgment.

The court ruled that any educational institution or the person feeling aggrieved by the decision of the Regulatory Authority may file their grievances for redressal before the committees constituted under the Act, 2017.

“We don’t feel that the provisions of the regulations for private schools in any way are in conflict with the provisions of the Parents Act or guidelines issued by this court issued on November 8, 2017,” the court ruled and thus dismissed all the review petitions against the high court decision.

It is pertinent to mention that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Private Schools Regulatory Authority had started implementation of the court’s judgment and also as per the

court order forwarded the private educational institutions’ list to State Bank of

Pakistan for freezing their accounts who are violating the court decision and regulations directives regarding decrease in the fee on various heads.

On the other hand, the apex court had restrained the private schools from charging fees during summer breaks and directed for issuing a public notice in Urdu and English dailies of the country.

The Supreme Court Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar observed that the state under Article 25-A of the Constitution is duty bound to impart education to the children free of cost.

The CJP was hearing an appeal filed by various private schools against Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government’s policy binding the educational institutions to charge 50 per cent fee during summer vacation.

He said that currently more students are enrolled in private institutions than in government schools.