Court questions Telangana, AP regarding the implementation of RTE Act

The Hyderabad High Court on Tuesday directed both the Telugu states, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana to explain the steps taken to implement the Right to Education (RTE) Act and the reasons for the failure to do so till now.

The bench of acting Chief Justice Ramesh Ranganathan and Justice K Vijaya Lakshmi acknowledged the need to comprehensively hear pleas pertaining to the RTE Act which mandates even private schools to provide 25% reservation to the poorer sections.

The petitioner argued that private schools are not worried about the 25% reservations to the poor as the government would reimburse the fees.

Yogesh Thandava who was fighting for the implementation of the Act and filed the PIL alleged that the real fear is about section 18 of the RTE Act that makes it mandatory for the district education officers to accord recognition only to such schools which provide the details of the fee collected by them.

Continuing further, he said that the DEOs are supposed to provide the details online in the education department’s website instead they are according recognition to schools under a GO issued in 1993.

The bench inquired as to which other states are implementing the Act and the petitioner informed regarding Delhi, Karnataka and several other states.