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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | 'RTE exclusion of minority schools needs review'-Bharath Joshi

'RTE exclusion of minority schools needs review'-Bharath Joshi

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published Published on May 11, 2013   modified Modified on May 11, 2013
-New Indian Express


Bangalore: Child rights activists are fuming over the Department of Public Instruction's (DPI) recent clarification that no section of the Right to Education (RTE) Act applies to unaided minority schools, prompting a need to revisit the Supreme Court order of last April.

After several ‘misinforming' statements by its own officials on various public platforms, the DPI, on April 24, clarified that "it would take no initiatives to enforce the RTE Act on unaided schools having the certificate of Declaration of Minority Status from the competent authority". As per records, the state has 1,059 schools declared as minority institutions.

S R Umashankar, commissioner for public instruction, acceded that the department erred earlier when it was thought that minority schools were only exempt from Section 12(1)(c), which refers to the 25 per cent reservation, and Section 18, which talks about registration of schools anew. "Later, we had internal discussions and we realised that the entire Act does not apply to such schools," he said.

The SC Decree

While upholding the Constitutional validity of the RTE Act, the Supreme Court, in its order, arrived at the conclusion that the Act, and in particular, the two contended sections, will lead to violation of Article 30(1), which guarantees religious and/or linguistic minorities to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice.

Supreme Court advocate Ashok Agarwal said the DPI notification is correct, in that it is in line with what the SC order actually means. "In fact, the SC is very clear that Article 21A (free and compulsory elementary education from ages 6-14) does not apply to unaided minority institutions. However, an interesting plea is before the SC now, in which the trajectory of the argument is headed towards invalidating this difference in status of minority and non-minority institutions," Agarwal said.

Agarwal said he has written to the Ministry of Human Resource Development to amend Article 21A or Article 15(5), to provide for reservation for socially and educationally backward classes in educational institutions, to bring minority schools under RTE's purview.

What's Next?

"The only course of action before us is to approach the court through a review petition by competent groups. We should start a campaign," said Vasudeva Sharma, executive director, Child Rights Trust.


New Indian Express, 11 May, 2013, http://newindianexpress.com/cities/bangalore/%E2%80%98RTE-exclusion-of-minority-schools-needs-review%E2%80%99/2013/05/11/article1585088.ece


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