The Right to Education Act that came into operation from this academic session prohibits screening of students and parents for admissions in schools, but it has been flouted by not only by many private schools but even by the Navodaya schools run by the Centre in Andhra Pradesh and many other states.
Much to the embarrassment of the Human Resources Development, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights has slapped notices on the Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti that runs these central schools for conducting entrance test for admissions in class VI in 603 Navodaya schools.
The notices direct the samiti to cancel admissions granted through the tests and issue fresh admission notice in conformity with the provisions of the RTE Act. The Samiti is in a bind as it says its admissions for the current academic year are already over and the commission's directive would amount to cancel admissions to 48,240 students who have been already granted admissions.
The samiti has taken the plea that the entrance test for admissions in its 552 Navodaya schools were concluded before April 1 when the law came into force and as such it has not violated the RTE Act. Its offer to sort out admissions given to some 4000 students on the basis of tests after April 1 in the remaining 51 schools can be rectified has been rejected outright by the commission.
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