Private schools’ lawyer urges SC to allow fee hike in view of rising inflation

ISLAMABAD: A lawyer representing private schools in a fee hike case informed the Supreme Court on Wednesday inflation had gone drastically up in the country, hence it could be questionable to ban raise in school fee, ARY News reported.

During the hearing, the lawyer said fee issue should be carefully looked into in view of rising inflation. The court responded that salaries of parents had not been increased therefore this factor couldn’t be ignored.

The lawyer argued that reports were about gas tariff going to be increased to 80 percent. “Do you want the school fee also go up the same way,” Justice Ejazul Hassan asked.

Read: Quality difference between private, government schools on the rise: SC

Chief Justice Asif Saeed Khosa said parents couldn’t be burdened too much with fee.

The lawyer said all issues should be examined and a reasonable hike be ordered in school fee. The court said reasonability in this issue was itself debatable.

The hearing of the case was later adjourned for a day.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court had remarked that a difference in quality of education by private and government-run schools was increasing with each passing day.

Advocate Faisal Siddiqui, representing the parents who petitioned in the apex court for reduction of schools fee, said the society couldn’t be sacrificed due to interest of a handful of people. He said the constitution guaranteed provision of education to children by the government.