SC sets aside Karnataka HC interim order allowing board exams in classes five, eight, nine, 11

March 12, 2024 09:46 pm | Updated 09:46 pm IST - NEW DELHI:

The Supreme Court on Tuesday set aside an interim order of a Division Bench of the Karnataka High Court permitting the State to hold board exams for classes five, eight, nine and 11.

A Bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and Pankaj Mittal observed that the Division Bench of the High Court ought not have allowed the conduct of board examination through an interim order after two Single Bench decisions had earlier quashed similar notifications or circulars.

The apex court observed that the proposed board exam was prima facie in the teeth of Sections 2(f), 16 and 30 of the Right to Education Act, which prohibit exposing children to the rigours of board exams till they finish elementary education.

The State notifications were challenged by the Registered Unaided Private Schools Management Association (RUPSA) and Organisation for Unaided Recognised Schools. The Single Bench of the Karnataka High Court had quashed the notification.

The Single Judge had relied on the decision of a Co-ordinate Bench in the previous year to quash similar circulars of the State to conduct board exams for classes five and eight.

However, a Division Bench of the High Court had the very next day, on March 7, stayed the Single Judge order.

The petitioners, represented by advocates K.V. Dhananjay, A. Velan, Sudharsan Suresh, Anirudh Kulkarni, Sainath DM, Ananya Krishna and Dheeraj SJ, had moved the apex court.

March 2023 tragedies

The petitioners contended that the State, by insisting on exposing younger children to the board, was risking the repeat of the tragedies of March 2023.

“Karnataka, unfortunately, witnessed a few child suicide cases in the month of March 2023. There was nothing that the helpless parents could do. The children were taking the board exams that the government had just introduced for children in studying in classes five and eight,” the petitioners said.

In 2023, the State was allowed by a Division Bench to quietly withdraw its appeal against the Single Judge order. “As a result, the government officers who devised these board examinations in the most illogical and unscientific manner obtained immunity from the educational statutes solely by virtue of the interim order passed by the Division Bench. A year after that tragedy, the cycle is set to repeat itself,” the petitioners had told the Supreme Court.