Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Tuesday pulled up the state government for not implementing its order to reserve 25 per cent of the seats in all private schools for students hailing from the economically weaker sections of society.
The court observed that the government had not made any effort to implement orders and to get grant-in-aid from the Centre under the Right to Education Act.
A division bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Raghavender Singh Chauhan and Justice A. Rajasheker Reddy came down heavily on the state government while dealing a PIL on non-implementation of free education to the weaker sections in private schools.
The bench asked Mr Janardhan Reddy, secretary of the higher education department, who had came to appear in another case, what he had done as an IAS cadre officer to get the grant-in-aid. When he replied that a reminder had been sent recently, Justice Chauhan expressed deep concern and asked, “Is this the way you deal with such an important issue?”
“When the Centre is turning a Nelson's eye to the request to sanction grant-in-aid as per the RTE Act, why has the state government has not approached the Supreme Court and dragged the Union government there? Why is the state is sitting on this issue for more than five years,” Justice Chauhan asked. “The bunch of public interest litigations pending before this High Court itself shows the grim efforts put in by the state government.”
Additional Advocate General J. Ramchander Rao said the government had taken the initiative in opening model schools and residential schools to impart education to the poor and needy and the fee of 2.19 lakh students was being reimbursed.
The court was not convinced and found fault with the bureaucrats heading the higher education department for not implementing the orders of the division bench of the High Court passed five years ago.
The court said the authorities should have put in some efforts to implement its order with regard to the future of students from poor families. “We are dealing with our children, not the children of Uganda or Kenya,” Justice Chauhan said.
The court asked the government to submit the steps taken to the implementation of its order by June 3.
