Supreme Court to decide validity of amended Karnataka RTE rules

BENGALURU: The Supreme Court will decide the constitutional validity of Karnataka Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (Amendment) Rules.
Agreeing to consider the issue, an apex court bench of Justices NV Ramana, Ajay Rastogi and Surya Kant ordered notice to the Karnataka government on Monday. The court, however, declined to grant any interim order against the high court's May 31 verdict uphelding the amended rules.
The amended rules, notified on January 30, barred the identification of an unaided school for admission under RTE quota if there are government and aided schools in the neighbourhood. As per the rules, in case students are admitted to private schools even if there are government or aided institutions nearby, the authorities cannot reimburse their fees.
Education Rights Trust and RTE students' and parents' association filed a special leave application in the SC. According to them, the amended rules affected the rights of students from weaker and disadvantaged sections of society, and Karnataka had seen over 90 per cent decline in RTI applications as per media reports.
The high court dismissed their appeal, describing as fallacious their argument that admission under RTE should be allowed in private unaided schools despite presence of government institutions in the neighbourhood. "If parents want to admit kids to private unaided schools (in such areas), it is their decision for which the government is not liable," a division bench of Justices L Narayana Swamy and PS Dinesh Kumar had observed while upholding the validity of the amended rules.