Regulating coaching centres

Guidelines are well-meaning but hard to enforce

The government’s latest guidelines for coaching centres is a well-meaning but optimistic attempt to bring some order into an industry that has fallen into some disrepute with a growing number of student suicides and accusations of misleading claims in advertisements. The guidelines are unexceptionable in intent. They set out, in some detail, conditions for registration, infrastructure requirements, timings, and fee structure. Among these guidelines are the requirements that a coaching centre must have more than 50 students with a minimum age limit of 16 years, all teachers must be graduates, the centre must not make false promises, fees from students