Tamil Nadu: Tough steps for Right to Education in Lucknow, IAS officer DM Surya Pal Gangwar has taken a decisive step to implement the Right to Education in Lucknow by issuing a 7-day ultimatum to 62 schools to admit children under the RTE Act. If these schools do not comply, they risk being sealed on the eighth day. During a meeting at the Collectorate, DM Gangwar reprimanded the operators of these prominent schools for not giving admissions under RTE, which will affect about 1,100 children eligible for admission in these institutions. Many children have been deprived of their educational rights due to these admission failures. In response, DM Gangwar has demanded that these schools speed up the admission process. This tough stand of Suryapal Gangwar is aimed at ensuring that the children of Lucknow can fully avail their rights under the Right to Education.
The Tamil Nadu government on Tuesday told the Madras High Court that it cannot apply the RTE Act to CBSE and ICSE schools as these schools are not subject to the fee structure prescribed by the government unlike matriculation schools. State’s attorney A Edwin Prabhakar made this statement before the first bench of Acting Chief Justice R Mahadevan and Justice Mohammed Shafiq when a petition filed by V Eswaran, Marumalarchi Makkal Iyakkam in Coimbatore came up for hearing under the RTE Act. The petitioner’s counsel said some schools in the state refuse admissions as the distance between the residence and the school is one kilometre. He wanted the court to direct that schools teaching as per CBSE and ICSE curriculum should also come under the purview of the RTE Act as the state government has the power to do so. The government says it fixes the fee structure for matriculation schools and pays the fees of students admitted under the RTE Act based on that structure. Since the government cannot fix the fee structure for CBSE and ICSE schools, it cannot enforce the law in those schools.
