Vijayawada: The state government has submitted to the High Court that it has not taken any decision to reopen schools, but deferred conduct of Class X final exams in the state.
A division bench comprising Justices D. Ramesh and K. Suresh Reddy heard a petition filed by a teacher Y. Uma Sankar from Srikakulam with a plea to declare as illegal the state government’s move to reopen schools from June 1 and conduct Class X exams from June 7 without giving Covid jab to all teachers in the state.
Petitioner’s counsel P. Suresh Kumar submitted to the court that nearly 400 teachers lost their lives due to Coronavirus in the state in the second wave of the pandemic, and prayed for allowing reopening of schools and conduct of Class X exams only after the vaccination of teachers.
Government special pleader C. Sumon submitted to the court that the state government had not taken any decision to reopen schools and conduct Class X final exams. He informed the court that as the Centre had not recognised teachers as frontline workers, it was not possible to vaccinate all of them as they were administering vaccines to the people aged above 45 years. He also informed the court that the state government deferred the conduct of Class X final exams.
