Leader of Opposition Atishi said the BJP deliberately delayed the bill from April to July using one excuse after another, so private schools could freely hike fees and extort money from parents
NEW DELHI — The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)’s legislative group on Monday held strong protests in the Delhi Assembly complex, in front of Mahatma Gandhi’s statue, opposing the Delhi School Education Transparency in Fixation and Regulation of Fees Bill 2025 brought by the BJP government.
Earlier, led by senior AAP leader and Leader of Opposition (LoP) Atishi, AAP legislators walked out of the House in protest.
Atishi said the BJP deliberately delayed the bill from April to July using one excuse after another, so private schools could freely hike fees and extort money from parents.
AAP put forward two clear demands: send the bill to a Select Committee to include feedback from parents and experts, and freeze all school fees at 2024–25 levels to stop arbitrary hikes.
“AAP will continue to fight for the rights of Delhi’s children and parents — BJP will have to listen to the people.”
Calling out BJP’s collusion with private schools, she exposed that BJP Delhi Executive Committee member Bharat Arora, himself a private school owner, is behind the bill. For the past ten years, he has been fighting court battles to raise private school fees and now, with his party in power, Education Minister Ashish Sood has tabled a bill drafted by him. “This bill serves no one but private school owners,” she said.
Earlier in the day, addressing the press conference alongside AAP’s Chief Whip Sanjeev Jha, Atishi attacked the BJP-led government ahead of the monsoon session, stating, “This time, the BJP government is bringing a bill under the guise of regulating private school fees. The bill was circulated among the MLAs just two days before being tabled. This bill has been created solely to allow private schools to hike fees. It is designed to serve the interests of private school owners.”
“The bill was passed in the Cabinet back in April. At the time, the government claimed a special session would be called to table it. No session was called in April. A special session was called in May, but was cancelled at the last minute. In June, the government said the bill would come through an ordinance. That ordinance was approved by the Cabinet and sent to the Centre — but it disappeared too. In July, we were again told that the bill will be tabled in this session.”
Slamming the delay, Atishi added, “April, May, June, July — four months have passed. Why? So that private schools that are hand-in-glove with the BJP could comfortably hike their fees in April. In these four months, parents were threatened, children were scared, and schools collected a full year’s hiked fees. That’s why the bill was deliberately not brought to the assembly earlier.”
She further added, “And now that the bill is finally being presented, it is 100% fraudulent. You can tell from the fact that private schools across Delhi have already hiked their fees for 2025–26, but this bill contains no provision to regulate those hikes.”
Atishi said, “The bill clearly states that a fee-fixation committee must be formed by August 15. Tell me, when the bill is only being tabled on August 4, debated, passed, sent to the Centre, and published in the Gazette — won’t August 15 pass by in the process? Then they’ll say the deadline has passed for this year and it will be implemented next year. Meaning, this year’s exorbitant fee hikes will remain completely untouched.”
Highlighting another serious loophole, she said, “This 13-page bill makes no mention of auditing private school accounts. Which means private schools can arbitrarily increase fees, citing imaginary expenses — and no one will be able to verify anything.”
On decision-making, Atishi pointed out, “Who will chair the fee-hike committee? The school management itself. The very management against whom parents have been protesting in 40-degree heat. It’s crystal clear this bill is designed only to protect private school owners.”
Announcing her party’s demands, she said, “We have two clear demands that we will raise in the Delhi Assembly. First, this bill must be sent to a Delhi Assembly Select Committee, which will consult parents, school staff, activists, and teachers. The bill should only be finalised based on their feedback.”
Picking up from Atishi, AAP’s Chief Whip in the assembly and MLA Sanjeev Jha said, “This bill has nothing to do with the welfare of parents or children. It is meant to shield the school owners who are exploiting families through arbitrary fee hikes. Ever since the BJP government came in, schools have raised their fees after 10 years. One after another, schools have increased their fees — and this bill is now being brought to give those hikes legal validity.”
Explaining the control mechanism, Jha said that “The fee-hike committee will be headed by the school management. They say there will be five parents, five school management representatives, and one government observer. Even if all five parents oppose a hike, the vote is tied, and everything depends on the government official. In other words, the BJP government is trying to institutionalise this protection through bureaucracy. We strongly oppose this bill. Our two demands will be raised in the Assembly — and if they are not accepted, we will resist the bill in every way possible.”
