HC orders admission based on Kannada medium

Bangalore, May 26: The Karnataka High Court on Thursday directed the 2,000-odd derecognised schools to proceed with admissions only in the medium of instruction permitted by the government.

These schools can impart education only in Kannada and not in English. The government derecognised 2,200 schools for imparting education in English, though they had taken permission to have medium of instruction in Kannada.

Vacation judge Justice A C Kabbin, who heard the batch of petitions including the one filed by Karnataka Unaided School Managements Association (KUSMA), stayed the derecognition orders in respect of those schools, who have approached the court, till June 4 and posted the matter before a regular Bench for hearing on May 29.

The court observed observed that the "Admissions to schools shall be only to such medium as had been permitted by authorities to that school. The schools shall exhibit a notice board in their respective admission counters clearly stating that admissions are made in only such medium and all admissions are subject to court's final order and this fact should also be mentioned in the receipts given to the parents/guardians."

Government advocate B Manohar told the court that there was no stay in respect of language policy of 1994 as claimed by the petitioners. In August 2006 Government found that thousands of schools were teaching in English medium though they had taken permission for Kannada medium. It ordered closure of these schools.

Following public outcry that the careers of lakhs of children studying in these schools will be in jeopardy, the government set April 10 as the deadline for the school closure and derecognised them and even imposed a penalty ranging from Rs 25,000 to Rs 1 lakh on the institutions to renew their recognition.

Last week the court stayed the penalty imposed on these schools.

The court's directive has come as a shock to the school managements which had gone ahead with its admission for 2007-08 despite the government warning it against admitting students.

"All schools will become empty because no parent will be interested in continuing their children in these schools if Kannada is the medium of instruction." said G S Sharma, president of KUSMA.

OneIndia News

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