The Maoist are the worst thing that happened to Nepal.

I did not have much interest in this article until I noticed some very interesting numbers here. I am not even sure you are right, are 5.5 million (that is 19% (18.97) people of the country at 29 Million) children studying in private schools with (I know) extortionate fees? Are you entirely sure that the average is Rs 11844? Because this implies that the numbers above the average are greater than the ones below. Even if we were to actually cut down the fee to Rs 9000 as average, then we are talking about a whopping Rs 49.5 billion in money generated, just to get a sense of how much that money is, I had to look at the numbers twice.

That is also a lot of tax generated, the fact that it then goes to government coffers and then is "utilized" to improve government schools means that there is a lot of wastage. How about letting government schools have that money directly, let's say in remote and less developed districts like Humla. Or, maybe cut the cost of books for children by buying that from publishers and letting children from less privileged areas have it at lower cost. Implementing all of this (and more) will require some innovative thinking which really is not what Nepal is apparently all about.

Secondly, if private schools are treated as businesses, isn't there any regulation about collusion or price fixing? I don't think businesses are allowed to do this kind of collective pricing. Knowing that they are a business, and that there are bound to be some laws against collusion, why is nobody trying to settle that sort of an issue in court?

Thirdly, no market in the world is efficient, (the west and the economics profession just figured that out in the stock markets after losing several billions) and consumers don't make unions (that is why no toothpaste or soft-drinks consumer union), instead there are interest groups which would represent aggrieved parties against what is seen as unfair behavior. No, they are not the mafia syndicate, they are called courts and the agents are lawyers. The guardians could also set up an interest group where they could devote some time to finding solutions for education. (please don't get cynical with this)

Fourthly, education as a need (and often with ineffective governments a fundamental right) is recognised everywhere in the world. Yet, schools fail, education policies in most developed and developing countries are in tatters. Scandinavians benefit from super stability and extremely large government coffers, but what makes their schooling good is a combination of effective monitoring, parent participation and stringent regulation. All of that requires some effort, who is making it?

Fifth, has anybody wondered why parents have to send their children to private schools? I think it is partly because of lack of awareness and also because common sense is dying. Evidence, collected all over the world, clearly suggests that more than schools it is the home environment which determines whether a child makes it in life or not.

Maybe that is the reason why I sympathise with Indu, even my neighbours kids like to tease dogs, one of them got bit. There is a lesson in that somewhere, but I forget what.

All of us, including me, like to rant...whether something gets done about it, is another matter...but, never the less,  let me put my points of view down.

First, I wonder how many of us here, author and commentators, are not products of private schools in Nepal? Second, why did our parent's enroll us to these school despite whatever the fees structure?

Answer is good education of course.

I don't disagree with any points made in the previous comments, but I truly believe this (and other things in Nepal) are just unnecesarily created chaos. Simply because someone saw a profit to be made from the chaos. To hell with everything else.

Where were the private and public schools say 15 -20 years ago? Same and actually in a better place than they are now. Wasn't it this warfare and 'propaganda' education that completely destroyed whatever public school sector there was? Weren't these schools rampaged, burnt, closed, children converted, teachers murdered, educational text converted to teach Maoism ?!!  and now the solution is to padlock whatever schools are left? I could go on a bit more about how bad it was to cultivate a political seed of your freaking belief into an innocent child's head without letting the child make a choice about it in the future, but I'll save that topic for another day.

Why don't they work on creating a correct and effective solution? Raise the level of education in public schools to such a level that parents have a CHOICE when deciding their child's future. Wouldn't the private sector have to come down in pricing to 'compete', at that point?

 As I recall, these committes like PABSON etc were made by these private sector educationists to safeguard their interests many year ago, when private schools were being shut, extorted etc by you know who. One way to see it is that the private education sector has to 'give in' to demands, and I am sure lots of money exhanges hands in the background. Wouldn't that be one reason to hike up fees? After all the losses have to balanced somehow. So who is to blame? the money giver or the money taker? I think it boils down to the 'create chaos and profit' theory I mention above.

If this ANNISU-R outfit was so caring towards the cause of education, why not put an indefinite strike to counter the May 1st strike? After all, a political (really?) party's egoistic shenanigan to grab power is deferring thousands of students from taking their Higher Secondary exams no? Isn't that an important matter? Supposedly not, what matters is 'finish the process of constitution writing and restoration of peace a.k.a my turn to be the prime minister now'.

Now that I am ranting, I must conclude by saying that Nepal's fast become a place of less work and more comittees, can't take a bold decision and do something? make a comittee. Defer the decision, keep going back and forth, create unneeded unions, groups, parties , affiliations, activists and more groups and unions..whose sole mission seems to be 'do nothing, just think how we can profit from the situation'...starting right at the top with the High Level something freaking comittee of ineffecient leaders whom we keep reading about every now and then, and whom we keep allowing to mismanage our country.

Thanks wtf, that's clear and straight, simple and easy, good stuff. I am from a Gov (PB) School by the way, I turned out alright.  

# 11 - Thank you, but I was driving at something much simpler. I think the responsibility of a child's welfare rests on parents who don't really pay as much attention as they need to. If this one bit is sorted, we would have a better country to live in with politer (and brainier??) people in it.

By the way, I checked and the fee in one of the lower end schools in my home town is Rs 1,000 (Rs 7500 admission fee), steep for the town. But the school I went to no longer is what it used to be. It has become a place of politics. And, the college, the less said the better.