A battle between the Rustomji Kerawalla Foundation and Kangaroo Kids Education Limited over the functioning and ICSE certification of the Billabong High school in Goregaon has put the academic future of more than 200 students in jeopardy.
Smita Deshmukh & Shweta ShertukdeA battle between the Rustomji Kerawalla Foundation and Kangaroo Kids Education Limited over the functioning and ICSE certification of the Billabong High school in Goregaon has put the academic future of more than 200 students in jeopardy.
With the ICSE refusing to affiliate the school, students will not be eligible to appear for Class X under any board of India. Added to this, Euro Kids — a leading publisher in India — has alleged that the school had been illegally reprinting children’s books imported by them and circulating it as part of their ICSE curriculum.
The worst hit in this are celebrity parents in Mumbai, many of whose children attend Billabong.
Anxious parents like adman Prahlad Kakkar, TV star Pooja Bedi and Gauri Khan met Lina Asher of Kangaroo Kids to sort out the crisis.
“According to the franchisee agreement, the Kerawalla Foundation has to apply for the ICSE as per our terms of the contract. Billabong has had more than three years to do so. KKEL is a service provider for quality education in terms of curriculum and teacher’s training. We have received complaints of the running of the school. I assure the parents that in any crisis, I will ensure that every student is admitted to another ICSE school,” said Lina Ashar, managing director, Kangaroo Kids, who has now flown to Delhi to check out the status on affiliation.
Parents showed DNA the notebooks of kids photocopied from top books like EB White’s Charlotte’s Web and Sarah, Plain and Tall from big publishing houses like Harper Collins and Puffin. Prajodh Rajan, vice-president, Euro Kids International, said, “They could use our books with prior sanction. Why photocopy them? The school has not even bothered to reply to our letter,” he said.
“The work books are supplied to us by KKEL. We are not aware that they are pirated or photocopied,” said Rustom Kerawalla, trustee of the Foundation. Denying that KKEL has copied its curriculum from private books, Ashar pointed out how Billabong Goregaon had refused to allow KKEL to print their workbooks and sheets.
“It is the only one out of our 13 centres which does not allow the central office to do their printing,” said Ashar.
The ICSE prescribes the curriculum for Std IX and XII. Schools are free to use any curriculum from KG to VIII, which does not conflict with the state’s education policy.
Parents of children who study at Billabong, Goregaon, spoke about the poor infrastructure, high fees (almost Rs1 lakh annually), the fact that there was no principal, not enough teachers and a shoddy curriculum.
Some celeb parents are all for KKEL. Worried for the future of son Varun in std VII, Kakkar said, “It is clear that the Kerawalla Foundation has goofed. I’m sure KKEL will sort out the problem.”
But Pooja Bedi said, “I shifted my daughter Aalia, a student of Std IV from Goregaon to Juhu Billabong as the former lacked quality. And till today, the Kerawalla Foundation has not given me a school-leaving certificate.”
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