BMC wants English, not Marathi, schools

Even as the state government has made Marathi a compulsory language for all non-SSC schools, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) seems to be backing only English-medium schools.

The Shiv Sena-ruled civic body has decided to impart primary education — one of the BMC’s obligatory duties — through English-medium schools. Reason being the lukewarm response the BMC has received for its existing Marathi-medium schools.

As per an earlier plan, the BMC had decided to allot all plots reserved for schools to private education institutions. In 2006, many educational institutes had even responded to the civic body’s advertisement for the plots and submitted interest bids along with a security deposit of Rs5,000 each.

The proposal to hand over the plots to private educational institutes was moved by Shiv Sena’s non-council member, Manohar Surve, in the education committee. He feared that the plots, with closure of Marathi and other language-medium schools, will be encroached upon.

But the civic administration has rejected the proposal stating that the BMC was itself in need of such plots for more English-medium schools.