CHANDIGARH: Punjab government has decided to take to task private schools in the state violating land allotment rules.

Land on subsidised rates to educational societies was allotted by the government asking these to enrol certain percentage of students from poor families.

However, it has come to light a majority of these schools have not followed the allotment rules.

Director-general (Schools) Krishan Kumar has written to these school societies seeking information on poor students on their rolls.

“These school have been asked to give names of the students, the classes they are studying in and their addresses to cross - check the information,” said Krishan Kumar.

The first set of this letter was sent to 15 schools in SAS Nagar district yesterday. These included schools run by the Mata Ajit Kaur Memorial Education Trust, the Cheema Educational Charitable Trust, the Smart Kids Educational Society, the Love Walk Educational and Welfare Society, the Sandhu Educational Trust, the Doon International Society, the Green Field Public School, the Jahangir Singh Memorial Educational Society, the Genius Educational Trust, the Shishu Niketan Model School, the Global Education Society, the Anchal Educational Society, the Hemkund Educational Society, the Riverdale Educational Society, the Agarwal Educational Trust and the Pooja International School.

Krishan Kumar said over the years many educational societies had been given large pieces of prime land on concessional rates.

One of the conditions of allotment was that these schools should have 15 per cent of their students from yellow cardholder families or from poor families. These students would not be charged any tuition fee.

“However, I have reasons to believe that most schools have not followed this condition and poor students do not have access to quality education, against the claims of these schools,” said Krishan Kumar.

“We have asked for a list of such schools in the rest of the state from PUDA, so that similar information can be sought from them,” he added.

A recommendation would be made to the government to resume the land or penalise the violators of the allotment rules.

The Congress regime had done away with the process of allotment of land to educational societies at concessional rates and started auctioning it.