Fee determination committee’s info incomplete and old, officials don’t update data for years

Chennai: A govt-appointed committee meant to keep a check on private school fees has failed at a basic task — keeping its own records up to date. Parents across the city say outdated, missing and incorrect fee details on the Tamil Nadu Fee Determination Committee’s website have left them confused whether schools are charging more than what has been officially approved.The committee, formed in 2009 and currently headed by retired justice R Balasubramanian, fixes tuition fees for private matric schools in the state for three academic years upon receiving applications for the same. The fixed fee is then displayed on school notice boards for parents and the public, and cannot be changed. Discrepancies in the fee fixed and charged by the school can be reported to the committee.However, parents say details on the website are incomplete, incorrect and outdated.

“I went to PS Matric School in Mylapore to admit my daughter. While the school displayed its fees for 2026-27, the information wasn’t available on the Fee Determination Committee website. When I went in person to flag a complaint, committee staff told me the school’s fee was fixed a year ago, but the information was not uploaded on the portal,” said K Saravanan, a parent, said.Even revised fees are often missing from the portal. Until Thursday, the committee website listed Kanakambigai Nursery & Primary School in KK Nagar as charging ₹4,840 for kindergarten and ₹6,050 for Classes 1-5, while the school’s website showed a fee of ₹13,070 for kindergarten and ₹15,730 for primary sections.

After TOI flagged the discrepancy, the committee staff updated the fees after a gap of four years.“There are hundreds of cases such as this, where fee details have not been updated since 2017. What is the point of having a committee that cannot bookkeep properly? It is a waste of time for parents, activists and the public who want to cross-verify information,” said S Arumainathan, TN students parents’ welfare association.The details for this academic year are incomplete, too. While officials say more than 50 schools had approached for revision this year, hardly 20 of them are there on the website even as two weeks have passed since schools reopened.Fee Determination Committee special officer I Angelo was unavailable for comments. An official admitted to the flaws and said the pending information would be updated soon.