Regulation of educational institutes: SC issues notice to school education secretary on contempt plea

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday sought a response from the school education secretary in the Ministry of Education on a petition alleging non-compliance of its order to consider a plea seeking directions to regulate all institutions imparting education or religious instruction to children aged below 14.

A bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu issued notice to T K Anil Kumar, Secretary (Department of School Education and Literacy), Ministry of Education, and sought his reply in four weeks.

The top court was hearing a contempt plea filed by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay, who alleged that the secretary did not take any action on his representation. On May 11, the top court had directed Upadhyay to make a representation before the Union of India with his plea.

The plea, filed through advocate Ashwani Dubey, had sought directions to "take appropriate steps to register, recognise, supervise and monitor all institutions imparting secular education or religious instructions to children up to the age of 14 years in the spirit of Article 21A read with Article 39(f), 45 and 51-A(k)".

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The petition stated that Article 30 does not grant any special or additional rights to minorities beyond what is already guaranteed under Article 19(1)(g) (right to practice any profession, occupation, trade, or business).

"Direct and declare that Article 30 is a specific reiteration of Article 19(1)(g) and doesn't confer any additional rights, benefits or privileges than the rights guaranteed to the citizens under Article 19(1)(g)," the plea said.

"Petitioner is filing the Public Interest Litigation under Article 32 for registration, recognition, supervision, and monitoring of all institutions imparting secular or religious education to children up to 14 years in the spirit of Article 21A, 39(f), 45 and 51-A(k).

"Petitioner submits that children are the backbone of the nation's growth and are also gullible and naive due to their tender age. Hence, the State has heightened responsibility towards them. This is an issue of national security as young kids (who) form the future of the nation, can be brainwashed or manipulated in the unregistered institution ," it said.

Upadhyay, in his plea, has claimed that he visited several districts along the Uttar Pradesh border, where numerous unregistered and unrecognised institutions were allegedly found operating. He said unregistered and unrecognised institutions are proliferating across the border areas of the country without any effective oversight or regulatory mechanism.