Schools heave sigh of relief, CM favours RTE extension

Delhi schools heaved a sigh of relief and welcomed the decision of the Delhi High Court, which made it clear that there was no stopping the nursery admission process currently underway.

In first comments, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said: “We are going through the order. The government is considering options.” She said personally she would like the ambit of the Right to Education Act expanded to include children under the age of six.

Ameeta M Wattal, principal of Springdales School and vice-chairperson of National Progressive Schools Conference, said: “We support the court order, the autonomy of schools has to be maintained.” She said had there been any delay in the order, it would have been a big issue for parents.

With the High Court ruling that the RTE Act does not apply to nursery except the provision to reserve 25 per cent seats for the economically weaker sections, Madhulika Sen, chairperson of the Forum of Public Schools, said “that is what we have been saying all this while that the RTE does not apply to nursery and KG.”

Sen also raised the point of autonomy of private unaided schools and said “the other 75 per cent should be left to us”. She said the forum held a meeting on Tuesday.

The petitioners, on the other hand, called the order “a partial victory”. Ashok Agarwal, counsel for petitioner Social Jurist NGO, said they will move the Supreme Court in the next two weeks regarding extension of the RTE.

Source:http://www.indianexpress.com/news/schools-heave-sigh-of-relief-cm-favours-rte-extension/1076670/

RTE only for 6-14 age group: Govt

Nursery admission No bar on screening procedure by schools for students below age 6: Govt to HC

The Central government informed the Delhi High Court on Wednesday that the Right to Education Act applies only to “elementary education” which is defined in the Act as education from Class I to Class VIII. Provisions of the RTE, the government said, are available only to children in the age group 6 to 14 years and do not affect primary education.

“There is no bar on a screening procedure by a school for students under six years of age,” the government counsel said in response to a specific question put by the bench of Chief Justice D Murugesan and Justice V K Jain.

The government filed an affidavit after it was asked by the High Court whether admission to the nursery class was regulated by the RTE Act.

The High Court has been hearing arguments on a PIL challenging two notifications by the Central government and the Delhi government allowing schools to formulate their own criteria for admission to the nursery class. The admission process has been stalled due to the pendency of the petition. The High Court had remarked that the admission process for 2013-14 could be affected by its final decision on the petition.

The government affidavit stated that “there are certain provisions of the Act, which relate to children below six years and beyond 14 years. These specific provisions, however, are those related to drop-out children and children from economically weaker sections.”

The government affidavit also mentions Section 11 of the RTE that speaks about pre-primary education for children above three years of age. The HRD Ministry affidavit says that state governments “may have their own policies governing admissions in pre-primary class”.

Additional Solicitor General Rajeeve Mehra also told the court that the Delhi School Education Act and notifications issued under the Act were there to regulate pre-primary education in Delhi.

“The affidavit is quiet on the question raised by the court about the utilisation of Section 13 in the Act. The HRD Ministry passed the buck to the state government to see the applicability in the last paragraph of the affidavit,” advocate Ashok Aggarwal said. Court said it will pass its order by next week.

Source: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/rte-only-for-614-age-group-govt/1073751/0

E-stamping in city courts

To ensure hassle-free transactions and prevent fraudulent practices, the Delhi government has introduced electronic-stamping facility in all the district courts in the city while doing away with stamp papers of all denominations.

“Delhi has become the first state in the country to introduce e-court fee in all its district courts…. The new system was first introduced in Delhi High Court in November, 2012. The exercise for all six district courts has been completed within just three weeks,” Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said.

She said this was a major step forward in the direction of a modern judicial system and an e-governed state. “The last court to implement the e-court fee system was the Kakardooma court where it was introduced last week,” Dikshit said.

It is a unique system, which enables the public and lawyers to get a court fee receipt of exact denomination, irrespective of the amount, thus, making the entire process of remitting court fee entirely paper-free,” she said.

Source:http://www.indianexpress.com/news/estamping-in-city-courts/1073279/

Hospitals can’t deny first response treatment to crime victims: HC

After it was told that accident or rape victims were often denied treatment by private hospitals, which did not want to involve themselves in crime cases, the Delhi High Court on Thursday held that private hospitals must must not turn away emergency patients on such grounds.

The bench comprising Chief Justice D Murugesan and Justice V K Jain issued the orders while hearing a suo motu case. An NGO had previously raised the question of speedy medical aid to victims. The point was raised again by counsel assisting the court, advocate Meera Bhatia.

The court directed Delhi government Principal Secretary, Health, “to issue appropriate directions to all hospitals to attend to all persons who are in dire need of immediate first-aid (or other) medical need due to involvement in some crime”.

The court also directed the Commissioner of Police to “issue instructions to all police personnel to take victims to nearest hospital for treatment”.

The court also asked police to look into a system of ‘SOS’ or ‘panic button’ messages, which could be sent by women from their cellphones to any number of their choice as well as to police.

“There could be some GPS-based system for a PCR van to track the location of the mobile phone from which the SOS message was sent. You could contact NIC or Infosys or TCS to consider this software,” the court said.

The court said Mumbai police was using a basic form of a similar system and asked the Delhi Police to “extend and refine” the software.

Source: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/hospitals-cant-deny-first-response-treatment-to-crime-victims-hc/1067700/