Bengaluru: As admissions for the academic year 2018-19 at various private schools are underway, crowds constituting parents and grandparents were spotted late night and early morning, braving winter outside two different schools, one at Indiranagar and one at J.P. Nagar. Although residents of surrounding areas were taken by surprise, the eager wait by parents led to discussions in and around the areas.
Saurabh Sharma, a techie who lives at Indiranagar, was on his way to have dinner on Friday night when he saw people sitting, even sleeping, on the pavements. “The first thing that came to mind was the scene from Hindi Medium, a film which deals with the pitfalls of our education system. I was shocked to see this play out in Bengaluru, but the fact that the wait was not for any free admission, but to a school which charges a hefty amount as fee got me thinking,” he elaborated.
For Himanshu Mani, a security guard of an apartment next to a school at JP Nagar, such an instance was familiar to him in the past only at railway stations. “People queue up a night before to ensure a tatkal berth for train journeys the next day, but people, including senior citizens, shivering out on the footpath speaks volumes of our education system,” he said. At least a hundred people waited outside the gate on Friday night while a fresh crowd was formed Saturday early morning outside both the schools as the last and only date for submission of applications for nursery admissions for the upcoming academic year fell on December 9.
“Getting our child into this school right from the nursery has been a dream for us and hence we (parents and grandfather of the child) decided to be on shifts to ensure the application was filed on time. We have pooled in money from friends and relatives towards paying the fee as this school guarantees no compromises for the quality of education provided to the children, unlike government schools,” said Sunil Nagoor, a resident of Jakkasandra, who works as an accountant in a private firm. Another parent, who sought anonymity, was disturbed of the fact that the school had made no suitable arrangements to ease parents’ distress. “The school should have deployed some office staff in shifts to collect applications round the clock foreseeing such a situation,” she said.
