Telangana: 50 colleges fined for working during holidays

Hyderabad: About 50 corporate and private junior colleges in the state have been fined between Rs 1 lakh and Rs 7 lakh penalty by the Board of Intermediate Education for conducting classes during Dasara holidays between October 14 to 21.

Colleges in Ranga Reddy, Medchal and Hyderabad districts have been issued showcase notices by district education officers. The officers, who were on rounds during the vacation, noticed that the colleges were operational and sent notices.

Mr Omer Jaleel, secretary, education department, said, “We have imposed a fine on these erring colleges at the rate of `1 lakh per day. Penalty has been imposed because they continued to operate despite being given a show cause notice.”

“Those who have conducted classes for seven days have imposed on them a fine of `7 lakh,” said Mr Omer Jaleel, secretary, education department.

Senior department officials said that they had served show cause notices earlier as well but had received no response from the institutes.

Education department officials complained that they received no response to their notices of this year but also previous years.

A senior officer said, “Every year, we issue notices and they ignore us. For this reason, this year, we decided that a penalty must be levied.” district officials said that the government orders were not being taken seriously by colleges, which continued to conduct classes despite declaration of holidays.

Some corporate groups had conducted classes for seven days despite notices being served.

After a penalty notice was served, a group of educational institutes visited the office of BIE, asking for the fine to be waved.

However, officials insisted that they pay the fine as they had not bothered to reply to earlier show cause notices.

“These educational institutes do not understand the meaning of a holiday.
This has been happening for last few years. Rules must be followed. Holidays will give respite to students who definitely need a festival break,” said the education department official.

Sri Chaitanya and Narayana group of colleges are the most prominent ones served notices. When contacted, they said they were not aware of any notice of penalty, but explained that they had not operated their colleges during the notified holidays.