{"id":231933,"date":"2020-07-08T18:32:17","date_gmt":"2020-07-08T13:02:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scconline.com\/blog\/?p=231933"},"modified":"2020-07-08T21:51:22","modified_gmt":"2020-07-08T16:21:22","slug":"undemocratic-circular-seeking-reconstitution-of-school-management-committees-in-delhi-challenged","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scconline.com\/blog\/post\/2020\/07\/08\/undemocratic-circular-seeking-reconstitution-of-school-management-committees-in-delhi-challenged\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Undemocratic\u2019 Circular Seeking Reconstitution of School Management Committees in Delhi challenged"},"content":{"rendered":"

Delhi High Court:<\/strong> A group of parents of government school students of Delhi have filed a writ petition before the Delhi High Court, challenging the Delhi Government circular<\/a> which has laid out instructions to reconstitute School Management Committees (SMCs). The School Management Committees constituted under Section 21 of the Right to Education Act, 2009 perform various functions including formulation of a School Development Plan which is the basis of plans and grants which are made by the local authorities to the School. The petitioners allege that the Government has arbitrarily issued instructions for the reconstitution of School Management Committees by way of online draw of lots. This, the petitioners allege, is contrary to the spirit of the Right to Education Act, 2009\u00a0 which mandates parent-guardian members to be elected and constitute the SMC’s through active participation of the community. The petition asserts that choosing parent representatives by a process which does not give any say to the very parents that these representatives will represent is undemocratic<\/p>\n

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Other objections filed by the petitioners against this government circular are that only a seven day window has been given to file nominations without any prior effort to spread awareness about the nomination process and roles and responsibilities of the SMC, thereby leaving many parent members excluded from the nomination process. Secondly, the nomination process is online, which excludes those who don\u2019t have access to internet facilities. The petitioners have questioned the need to reconstitute the SMCs in the middle of a pandemic.The timing of this circular excludes deeply vulnerable groups, those who are shifting to government schools from private schools because of loss of livelihood and others affected by the pandemic for various reasons.<\/span><\/p>\n

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The petitioners have prayed for the following:<\/p>\n