Peira restrained from coercive measures against private schools.

Byline: Kashif Abbasi

ISLAMABAD -- The Islamabad High Court (IHC) has restrained the Private Educational Institutions Regulatory Authority (Peira) from taking coercive measures against schools after Peira issued directives to private schools telling them to charge fees in accordance with the base fee in 2017, as ordered by the Supreme Court.

A Peira document said that it directed all schools to charge fees in accordance with the fees in January 2017 following a detailed SC judgement dated Sept 13. However, private schools filed a case in the high court challenging Peira's letter, and the court granted a stay in their favour.

The document was shared with members of the Senate Implementation Committee on Tuesday in the shape of a working paper. It will be taken up by the committee at its next meeting.

The committee met at Parliament House to discuss an agenda item titled 'Further consideration of point of public importance regarding charge of h0lidays fee by private educational institutions raised by Senator Manzoor Ahmed Kakar in Senate sitting held on 26-04-2019'.

However, the committee's convenor Senator Dilawar Khan decided to defer the agenda item because Senator Kakar was not present at the meeting.

Senate body briefed on issuance of Pakistan origin cards to Pakistanis living in Europe

Peira's working paper said that in pursuance of the detailed SC judgement in the private schools' fee determination case, the court in the operative part of the judgement directed: 'The said amount equivalent to 20pc of fee (reduced under our orders) or any other amount shall not be recovered as arrears for any reasons or under any circumstance.'

The judgement added that schools have increased fees excessively since 2017 in violation of the law, and struck down all such increases. 'It will be deemed that there was no increase in fee since 2017 and fees were frozen at the rates prevailing in January 2017,' it said.

The SC decided that fees would be recalculated using the fees prevailing in 2017 as the base fee until 2019 and onwards, with annual increases permitted by the law, rules and regulations.

The judgement said the process of recalculation 'shall be supervised by the regulators and only the fee approved by them shall be treated as the chargeable fee.'

Peira explained that the SC also said that any excess found to have been charged would be adjusted in future fees. Regulators will monitor fees charged by private schools, the SC...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT