Maoist rebels have harnessed the popular concept of free schooling to organize attacks on private schools. There are some 9,000 private schools, with 1.5 million students. Public schools  are expensive for the government, and tend to be less effective, and numerous, than private schools. There has long been a popular student demand for quality public schools, and the Maoists are attacking private schools, which the rebels consider "unfair,"  with guns and bombs to shut them down. The Maoists want the private schools to cut fees and change the way they operate (like remove pictures of the king from classrooms.)