Anshika Tiwari-
A mother of a Class XI student moved to the Kerala High Court to seek a direction to the Central Board of Secondary Education as well as the school in question, ‘Choice school’.
Justice Anu Sivaraman of the court has posted the matter for further consideration to next week
The petitioner has challenged the unjustified denial of admission in Class XI to her daughter by the school authorities. The school here denied admission citing low marks in mathematics.
The petitioner’s elder daughter recently sought to join the Science stream in Class XI upon completing Class X. and she did not choose Math as a subject in her options.
Nevertheless, the school denied her admission to the chosen stream saying that her marks in mathematics in the onsite examinations were not sufficient enough to secure admission.
Counsel for petitioner, Advocate H Ramanan argued before the court that as per the CBSE scheme of studies, students had the liberty to opt for subjects in any combination, without any streaming.
All schools, he added, were compulsorily required to adhere to the said scheme in offering subjects in Class XI.
The petitioner in her challenge said that the school management’s stance was contrary to CBSE rules as well as the Centre’s New Education Policy.
The school in its defence stated, “We are acting according to our own policy decision”.
In addition, the respondent school also coerced the petitioner to pay the admission charges and allied fee to secure a seat in Humanities, contrary to the students will.
On objecting to the above proposal, the petitioner said, they were asked to wait for results of the Board examination to secure a Science stream seat.
To this, she added, it would be detrimental to her daughter since it is highly likely that the results would only be announced after the commencement of classes.
The said decision, petitioner alleged, is not only violative of the standard operating procedure for admission to Classes IX and XI included in the framework but also the guidelines of 2020-21 framed by the school.
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