E-Paper
Punjab and Haryana HC quashes NCMEI notification granting minority status to St Kabir
Bench held that neither the society running the St Kabir School, Chandigarh, nor the institution itself was a minority institution
A division bench of the Punjab and Haryana high court on Friday quashed a 2014 notification of National Commission for Minority Educational Institution (NCMEI) granting minority status to the St Kabir School in Sector 26.
The judgement came from the bench of justice AG Masih and justice Sandeep Moudgil on the plea from Chandigarh administration, in which a single bench judgement from 2021, was challenged. Notably, in March 2020, a high court single bench had dismissed an earlier 2018 plea from the UT against the school on the issue.
The court bench held that neither the society running the school nor the school is a minority institution. “The society was established purely as a secular society with no semblance or relation to any minority community/linguistic minority muchless Sikh minority community,” the bench observed, referring to when school was allotted a plot in 1988.
The bench further observed that for a minority educational institution to be declared such, the first requirement is that it has to be established by a minority or minorities and administered by the same group. “...the NCMEI has totally ignored and overlooked the aspect with regard to the fulfilment of the mandate of the statute,” it said, referring to facts of the case.
Chandigarh has 22 minority schools, but out of the 13 schools that opted for the status after 2012, only were given a no-objection certificate (NOC) by the UT administration. There has been a spurt in the cases of schools seeking minority status after the apex court in 2012 directed that such schools were not bound to reserve 25% of the seats for EWS category at the entry-level classes under the Right to Education (RTE) Act. The city has a total of 82 private schools.
The UT administration had also challenged minority status given to Vivek High School, Sector 38. A high court single judge bench quashed the order and now, the school’s plea against the same is pending before a coordinate division bench.
“The judgement will have a bearing on all such cases,” senior standing counsel, UT, Anil Mehta, who led the team on the issue, said.
The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, was passed by the Parliament. In 2012, the apex court ruled that the operation and applicability of this act would not extend to the unaided minority schools.
“It is, thereafter, that for the first time, school, in order to come out of the rigours and applicability of the Education Act, 2009 moved an application before NCMEI for grant of minority status,” the bench observed, adding that it was not before 2013 that the school projected itself as a Sikh minority institute, with the members of the society belonging to the Sikh community.
