‘Rules for Kota, Hyderabad’: Centres point to ‘loopholes’ in coaching regulation guidelines

NEW DELHI: Coaching institutions say there are several “loopholes” in the guidelines for regulating the coaching centres issued by the ministry of education on Thursday. Members of coaching institute associations have pointed to the silence on online coaching and asked if the institutes providing coaching for civil services and others are out of the ambit of regulation, since the document mostly talks about school students and school hours.

As the education ministry guidelines state that students below 16 years of age cannot be enrolled in coaching institutes, questions have been raised about institutes which run abacus, vedic mathematics, robotics and coding classes for junior students.

On Thursday, the union government issued “Guidelines for Regulation Coaching Centres'' for states to follow and frame regulations on. These guidelines come in the wake of a spate of suicides in Kota, Rajathan, a coaching hub where, in 2023 alone, there were over two dozen suicides among young students preparing to write one of two major admission entrance tests – the JEE Main and Advanced for engineering and the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) for medicine.

“The issues related to the private coaching centres more so in the context of rising student suicides cases, fire incidents, lack of facilities as well as methodologies of teaching have been engaging the attention of the government from time to time,” says the document which also notes that there is no existing policy to regulate private coaching. According to data from the National Crime Records Bureau, over 13,000 students died by suicide in 2022.

Also read Kota Suicides: ‘Students who come for JEE, NEET preparation become extremely unempathetic’

No coaching during school hours

The guidelines state that coaching classes will not be held during school hours for students enrolled in school or studying in other institutions. This is to ensure that their regular attendance in formal educational institutions remains unaffected and also to avoid dummy schools. “The curriculum or class timetable may be suitably spaced out to allow the students to relax and recuperate and thus, not build additional pressure on them,” say the guidelines.

Keshav Agarwal, president of Educators Society, a consortium of close to 300 coaching institutes, said: “Some students choose open schooling and prepare for exams while attending classes in the morning. Restricting their ability to study in the morning infringes upon their rights under Article 14, 19, and 21. The same applies to students who drop a year to prepare for exams, as there is no limit on the number of attempts in medical exams.”

Agarwal added: “Similar is the case for individuals preparing for exams to join the Indian Administrative Services (IAS), Staff Selection Commission (SSC) and even banking exams. How does one define class hours for such coaching institutes?”

Also read IIT Kanpur PhD student dies by suicide; second death in January

Coaching classes defined

The guidelines also define “coaching” as meaning tuition, instructions or guidance in any branch of learning imparted to more than 50 students but does not include counselling, sports, dance, theatre and other creative activities.

A representative of a coaching institute based at Munirka in south Delhi, requesting anonymity, said: “This regulation seems to be only for bigger institutes and the ones which are running with fewer students are not required to be part of the regulation. Also the enrollment of students in coaching centres is constantly changing, as students leave after completing their courses. Who is going to constantly monitor this and it is only going to open up avenues of corruption by the implementing body.”

However, the spokesperson of Allen Career Institute – colloquially known as Allen Kota Rajasthan – said: “We welcome these guidelines and look forward to working with the government in shaping them for the benefit and well being of the student community.” In 2023, Rajasthan government had issued guidelines for coaching centres as well.

Residential coaching centres

The guidelines require that within the basic structure of the coaching centre, one square metre area may be allocated to each student during a class or batch. Coaching centres must have space and infrastructure in proportion to the number of students enrolled.

“The regulations in the draft seem to mainly cater to coaching centres with residential facilities, such as those in Kota or Hyderabad. For local centres where students attend for only two to three hours, most of these rules become redundant,” said Agarwal.

He added: “At coaching institutes, students enrol by choice. It is the government, who by introducing exams like Common University Entrance Test (CUET) and the Joint Entrance Examination JEE (Advanced), increased the pressure on students and led to growth of the coaching industry.”

Another coaching institute owner remarked, “The regulations seem to have been prepared in a hurry and everything included. It should have done this slowly, first enforcing the refund bit – if a student doesn’t like the environment of the coaching institute – student capacity in a class and misleading advertisements.”

The regulations state that “the tuition fees for different courses or curriculum being charged shall be fair and reasonable and receipts for the fee charged must be made available” and that if the student opts to leave the classes midway after paying in full, they will be “refunded from out of the fees deposited earlier for the remaining period, on pro-rata basis within 10 days”.

The model regulations forbid batch segregation according to academic performance as it “leads to excessive pressure on the students affecting their mental health”

Most coaching institutes said that with such regulation, the government has legitimised and considered registering coaching centres.

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