Ensure 25% BPL quota in schools, Gujarat High Court tells state

DNA: Ahmedabad: Wednesday, January 10, 2018.

The Gujarat High Court on Tuesday directed the state government to ensure that schools that are granted affiliation by the state board starting next academic year implement 25 per cent reservation in each class for poor children, as required under the Right To Education (RTE) Act.

The second division bench of justice MR Shah and justice Biren Vishnav, while disposing of a public interest litigation filed by Sandeep Munjyasara, has ordered the state government to see to it that all schools, while granting admission, abide by the 25 per cent quota stipulated by the RTE Act from next year itself.

The court also said that in the event any school is found violating the norms or is unwilling to implement the RTE, the state government should initiate action against them.

If any child has been left out from the admission process, the government has to take up the issue with the respective school to see that the child gets admission, the bench said .

The court is of the opinion that the Act was introduced to see that children belonging to economically weak families get admission in neighbourhood schools.

The motive behind this is that each and every child gets basic literacy and is able to exercise their fundamental right to education.

Hence, it is the government's responsibility to ensure successful implementation of the Act, the court said.

The petitioner had approached the high court with the complaint that many schools got fresh permissions to operate in academic year 2017-18, but none of them have given admission to a child under the RTE Act.

The petitioner claimed that he had filed an application under the Right to Information (RTI) Act seeign information on such schools, but no details were furnished. He had, therefore, appealed before the information commission, where the case is pending, he said.

As the petition was filed in the last calendar year, five months after the academic year, he pleaded that the court direct the state government to see that in all these schools, children are given admission under the RTE.