Education department, on Wednesday, issued show cause notice to St. Xavier’s School Bathinda for demanding fees during lockdown period by defying government directions. Punjab education minister Mr. Vijay Inder Singla has been personally ensuring strict action against the violating schools as he had floated his email id, [email protected], to receive such complaints from the parents. Mr. Singla informed that till now 38 schools have been served notices for violating government orders.The cabinet minister said that the schools should also not charge transportation fees and books charges from students for the next academic session till the lockdown period is over.Mr. Singla said that the education department had issued an order dated March 23, 2020 in which all the private schools in the state have been asked to reschedule their admissions for 2020-21. He added that wide these orders, the schools were directed to provide window period of atleast 30 days for submission of fees after the situation gets normalised. He said that the schools have also been directed not to charge any late fees or fine from the students for this period. He added that after the issuance of these orders, the schools were regularly being warned of strict action for defying the direction through various means including press.“Show cause notices have already been issued to the violators and they have been given a 7-day period to file their reply against the violation. If they failed to give satisfactory reply, we are going to cancel their affiliation or no objection certificate (NOC),” Mr Singla said.The cabinet minister said that Coronavirus is a worldwide disaster and due to the lockdown, the parents are not able to pay the fees even through online banking options. He added that the spread of coronavirus has brought down all the businesses to a standstill and the private schools should also cooperate with the state government by following its directions.