The government has scrapped several discretionary quotas including that of Members of Parliament (MP) for admission to Kendriya Vidyalayas, a decision which will help free over 40,000 seats in the centrally-funded schools.

The move comes weeks after the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (KVS) put all discretionary quotas on hold for admission to various central schools across the country, following a review.

There are over 1,200 KVs in the country with over 14.35 lakh students. 543 MPs in Lok Sabha and 245 MPs in Rajya Sabha could collectively recommend up to 7,880 admissions a year under the quota.

According to the revised admission guidelines issued by KVS, the government has also decided that children orphaned due to COVID-19 will be considered for admission over and above the class strength in Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVs) under the PM CARES for Children Scheme.

The admission will be done on the basis of a list given by the district magistrate, subject to 10 children per Kendriya Vidyalaya. The admissions for the 2022-23 academic session is underway and will continue till June.

Under special provisions, MPs had discretionary power to recommend the admission of 10 children to a Kendriya Vidyalaya. Even a district magistrate had powers to recommend 17 students under the sponsoring authority quota in KVs.

According to officials, doing away with this special privilege will also help stop crowding of classrooms.

“The quotas have also distorted the overall percentage of SC, ST and OBC reservations in schools. A review of the functioning of KVS was carried out by the Education Minister and Chairman. It was observed that these quotas crowd the classrooms, adversely affecting Pupil-Teacher Ratio and quality of teaching and learning,” a senior official said.

“On the other hand, wards of transferable central government employees who should be given priority in admissions were not able to find their rightful places in KVs, hence the decision was taken to discontinue the quota,” the official added.

Other than the MP quota, the KVS has also removed other quotas including that of 100 children of education ministry employees, children and dependent grandchildren of MPs and retired KV employees, and the discretionary quota of school management committee chairman.

The special provisions that have been retained include admissions for children of recipients of Param Vir Chakra, Maha Vir Chakra, Vir Chakra, Ashok Chakra, Kirti Chakra and Shaurya Chakra; recipients of the national bravery award; 15 children of Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) employees; children of central government employees who died in harness and children who have shown special talent in fine arts.

The Central government had last year scrapped the Union education minister’s discretionary quota for admissions from the 2021-22 academic session.

Recommendations made by Union ministers for admission to KVs were also done away with.

According to the fresh guidelines, 60 admissions in KVs located anywhere in the country can be utilised exclusively for children returning from abroad along with their parents after their posting in current or previous years, and they would be considered for admission up to November 30.

“All these admissions will be subject to the condition that not more than five children would be admitted in one school in a year and that the children would be submitting a transfer certificate of a school abroad, in which they had been studying prior to seeking admission in a Kendriya Vidyalaya,” stated the guidelines.

As per the revised guidelines for the 2022-23 academic year, reservations in admission will be extended only to SC, ST, OBC and children with disabilities.

The three per cent reservation for persons with disabilities is supernumerary.

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