KOLHAPUR: After an abysmal response in the first round of admissions under the Right to Education (RTE), the district primary education department has decided to conduct a second phase of RTE from Sunday.According to the primary education officials, there are more than 2,500 vacant seats under the RTE this year. Therefore, parents have been requested to apply for the online admission process by May 10.District primary education officer, Subhash Chougule said, "Looking at the low response from the first round of admissions, the higher officials have decided to go for a second round of admissions. We have decided to commence the second phase of RTE admission process from April 30.""It is a good chance to improve the RTE admission turnout in this academic year," he added.Of 3,286 seats there are 2,727 seats which are still vacant across more than 280 private schools in the district. In the first phase, only 559 admissions were confirmed." an official said."The RTE department had received around 1,230 online applications but more than half of these applications were rejected back then. We are giving these parents another opportunity to submit the right set of documents and get their children admitted," he added.Another official said,"From this year onward, the parents can produce there rent agreement are their original address proof. Schools cannot reject the admission forms based on small mistakes such as spelling errors in the names of the students in the online application form. As many as 3,286 seats are reserved for primary school kids in 321 schools across the district. It has to be noted that admissions under the RTE started from January 16 this year. Under the RTE act , economically and socially disadvantaged children, as well as those with disabilities, can be admitted to Class I or at the pre-primary stage in private unaided schools. These children receive free education including textbooks and other facilities.

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