In a bid to address pressing grassroots concerns, Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) founder Abhijeet Dipke announced a new nationwide public outreach initiative titled Kya Bolti Public on Thursday.
The campaign aims to engage directly with citizens across the country to gather first-hand insights into everyday public issues, with a strong initial emphasis on education reform.
Highlighting the growing financial strain on working families, Dipke stated that the initiative’s primary focus will be tackling skyrocketing tuition, coaching, and higher education fees.
Rising School Fees and Financial Strain on Families
Addressing reporters during the launch, Dipke expressed deep concern over the commercialization of basic schooling, pointing out that annual fees for primary education have reached unsustainable levels for average households.
”Education reform will be our first issue that we are going to take up,” Dipke noted. “We believe education has become unaffordable in the country. Annual fees are in the range of ₹1 lakh to ₹2 lakh for Class 1, over and above the donation money”.
Questioning how lower- and middle-income families are expected to navigate these inflated costs, he emphasized that standard household incomes simply cannot keep pace with tuition inflation.
College Debt and the Call for True Education Reform
Beyond primary schooling, the Kya Bolti Public campaign will focus on the compounding costs of higher education and private coaching centers. Dipke alleged that escalating college fees are forcing an increasing number of guardians and students into long-term loan traps just to secure basic qualifications.
”College fees and coaching fees are also becoming too high, bringing families into the burden of loans,” Dipke said. “We want to free families from this. Parents should not feel burdened if they want to give higher education to their children”.
Invoking Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s constitutional vision, Dipke argued that learning must remain an accessible public good rather than a profit-driven industry. He noted that education was envisioned as a fundamental right, yet recent trends have transformed it into a commercial enterprise designed to maximize financial gain.
Through the ‘Kya Bolti Public’ outreach, CJP plans to gather public testimonies and mobilize community support to advocate for regulatory caps on private tuition fees and policy measures that safeguard equitable access to quality education.
