Chennai: The Madras high court on Wednesday ordered notice to the state government on a public interest litigation, which sought a direction to ensure that all schools mandated to admit 25 per cent seats with disadvantaged/weaker sections students for the academic year 2015-16 without any delay. A division bench comprising justices R. Subbiah and K. Ravichandra Baabu posted after two weeks further hearing of the PIL filed by Change India (a centre for advocacy and research) by its trustee A. Narayanan.
According to petitioner, as per section 12 (1)[a] of the Right to Education Act, the unaided charitable non-minority schools including CBSE should reserve 25 per cent seats for disadvantaged groups/weaker sections students.
On April 24, 2015, it was reported in the media that the TN Nursery, Primary, Matriculation, Higher Secondary and CBSE schools association had passed a resolution that they will not comply with the provisions of 25 per cent reservation for students belonging to disadvantaged groups/ weaker sections for the forthcoming academic year as the government has not reimbursed the fees due to them under the RTE Act for the previous years to the extent of Rs 150 crore. Hence, the students belonging to disadvantaged groups/weaker sections who were entitled to admissin in the forthcoming academic year will be prejudicially affected, he added.
