"Dummy Schools” condemned by Rajasthan HC as Threat to Education System

Rajasthan high court has strongly criticised the rise of Dummy Schools calling it a threat to the education system. The court has ordered a SIT probe and called for urgent reforms to curb the spread. CBSE is also barring dummy admissions from board exams, insisting schools and coaching centres take accountability. 

What are Dummy Schools? 

Dummy schools are institutions where students of 9-12 grade are formally enrolled but do not attend regular classes both online and offline. These students instead of focusing on school, are more invested in preparing for competitive exams and attend private coaching classes  for exams like JEE, NEET, etc. These schools openly grant permission for regularly attending coaching classes instead of school. Such a trend came in sight of the Rajasthan government where they realised how it has transformed school education into a mere formality for thousands of aspirants, mainly in cities like Kota, Rajasthan.

Schools Found Guilty by CBSE

Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) made surprise visits to 27 schools in 2024 in Delhi and Rajasthan. CBSE de-affiliated 21 schools in the city of Delhi and the state of Rajasthan, 16 in Delhi and 5 in Kota and Sikar, due to not having sufficient numbers of attending students in the schools, mainly in Classes 9 to 12. Video evidence of systemic dummy admissions led to the downgrading of six other Delhi schools from senior secondary (10+2) to secondary (Class 10). 

Kota: The Dummy School Hotspot in India.

• The epicentre of Dummy Schools is Kota, Rajasthan, where more than 1 lakh (100,000) students annually receive competitive exams coaching in more than 100 institutes.
• As young as Class 9, students enroll in dummy schools with the exclusive aim of spending the entire year attending coaching schools to take exams such as IIT-JEE and NEET, and frequently skip school in the process. 
• The nexus between private schools and big coaching centres in Kota incentivises this parallel education system. 

CBSE & High Court: What Decisions were made? 

CBSE asserted that the purpose of school education is the opposite of the use of dummy admissions which undermines the overall growth of the students. The court said that education boards must   ensure that attendance is mandatory for all students from classes 9 to 12 and set some strict rules to curb such unethical practices disrupting holistic education and development.

Rajasthan HC has directed CBSE and state government to form a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to conduct surprise checks and impose severe punishments on the guilty coaching centres and schools. The affected schools have been given show-cause notices by the HC and CBSE and ordered to take corrective measures or face the danger of being permanently disaffiliated in case of repeat violation. 

Findings of Inspections

• Faking admissions has become a trend; schools show a big gap between the number of students enrolled and those taking classes.
• Evidence on video recordings of surprise visits showed that some students had not been to school in a whole semester, which was against CBSE standards in attendance. 
• In Kota, much advertising is done by the dummy schools to tout their success rates, and parents have no choice but to send them.

Why Is Dummy School Trend a Threat?

This trend of Dummy Schools is a threat because students fail to enjoy holistic education, such as extracurriculars, life skills, and social development. The stress of pursuing high-status jobs grows; in the first eight months of 2023, Kota alone recorded 20 suicides in students. Also, the unnatural school-coaching nexus undermines the trust in the formal education system and introduces inequality.

Reform Roadmap Ahead

Rajasthan HC demanded reforms to make students have the freedom to pursue other careers instead of being engineered to become doctors. Auditing activity of CBSE will go on, and all schools threatened with non-cooperation with dummy admissions, or penalties including termination of listing. It is believed that SIT teams will become more vigilant and have surprise inspections across the state of Rajasthan in order to rebuild credibility in school education.