HC pulls up JNV Scheme authorities over 'hyper technical approach' to admissions

Is the objective of the Maharashtra governments Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya Scheme being fulfilled when authorities blindly adopt a hypertechnical approach to deny education to those entitled the Bombay High Court asked in a case related to admission of five studentsA division bench of Justices Gautam Patel and Neela Gokhale in a judgment passed on February 17 quashed a November 2021 order passed by the concerned authority cancelling admission granted to five 11yearolds in the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya School in Ratnagiri for Class VIAdmission is made on the basis of Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya Selection Test JNVST designed and conducted by the CBSEAs per the plea the five children originally from Kolhapur were Class V students of a government run school in Ratnagiri They claimed they had filled out applications to appear for the JNVST for securing admission in the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya in Ratnagiri for Class VIAlso readNarendra Dabholkar murder Bombay High Court grants CBI four weeks to decide on probe conclusion reportThe JNVST 2021 which was to be held in March 2021 was rescheduled on three occasions due to the ongoing Covid19 pandemic and was finally held in August 2021All five petitioners appeared and their names were in the merit list when the results were declared on September 28 2021 They submitted their documents online and were granted admissionHowever in November 2021 their admissions were cancelled on various grounds including that they were in the middle of Class V when they secured admission and also that they were from Kolhapur and hence cannot be granted admission to a school in RatnagiriThe bench however refused to accept these grounds and said merely reciting that the parents stay in Kolhapur district is insufficientThere is no law that a child may not be sent away from his hometown for the purposes of education it saidOnce admission is granted it cannot be cancelled on the basis that one year has not been completed because the year began late owing to the pandemic the bench saidThe court also pondered whether the objective of government was to assist students in getting education particularly in stressful and unprecedented times such as the pandemic or to blindly adopt some hypertechnical approach to deny education to those entitled in law to itWe must ask the questions as to what purpose is being served by this action and whether the object of the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya Scheme is in fact being fulfilled the court saidAs to the question of delay and laches we are unable to understand how this can ever be taken by a body that is set up to promote education and to use it against students seeking an education it addedThe bench quashed the impugned order of November 2021 which cancelled the five students admission and directed the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya at Ratnagiri to forthwith grant admission to the five students in Class VII for the academic year 202223This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever