Despite vacancies in schools in the state, more than 44,000 students were dropped out of admission process conducted under Right To Education (RTE) Act. This was revealed on Friday when a petition filed by Indore Parents’ Association (IPA) in Indore bench of Madhya Pradesh High Court was taken up for hearing. Division bench of Justice PK Jaiswal and Justice Vivek Rusia after going through the petition reserved its order.
According to IPA president Anurodh Jain, 2,94,871 children had submitted their applications against 4,04,108 seats available in schools in the state under RTE. “Out of 2,94,871 applicants, 2,50,428 children were selected through an opaque online lottery system and remaining 44,443 children were dropped out for an unknown reason, virtually denying their fundamental and constitutional right to free and compulsory elementary education, which is guaranteed to every child in the country,” he said.
The IPA alleged that during the conduct of online admission under RTE Act, certain ineligibility norms were arbitrarily introduced and 16,148 students were declared ineligible only on the basis of domicile, age, admission quota and mismatch of name/father’s name/gender filled in application form and documents. Since thousands of children did not get fair chance of admission, the IPA had lodged a complaint with state school education minister and requested for second round of admission process but there was no response. As a result, IPA moved court. IPA’s counsel Vibhor Khandelwal said court has listed matter for September 17.