Nagpur: A five-year-old boy has moved the Nagpur bench of Bombay high court against a city school for withholding his KG-1 result over “unpaid fees”.The petitioner Dhairya Bansod also pointed out that the school, situated in Dabha, has stopped his promotion to KG-II even though his parents have paid Rs46,800, as per RTE provisions, against Rs86,800 fees demanded by the school.Criticizing the school for depriving the petitioner of opportunity to take further education, a division bench comprising Justice Sunil Shukre and Justice Anil Kilor on Tuesday directed the school management to hand over final report card to Dhairya’s parents and take necessary action regarding his promotion to the next class in accordance with law.“Having considered the submission that in spite of payment of tuition fee in accordance with the provisions of Right to Education Act, 2009, the respondents are withholding the final report card of master Dhairya, thereby depriving him an opportunity of taking further education, which is violative of fundamental right of the student,” said the judges.While issuing notices to respondents, including chief and additional secretaries of Maharashtra school education department, school principal and managing director, the bench clarified that the petition would be kept for final disposal at the admissions stage.The child through his father Pritesh Bansod, a lawyer practising in HC, has prayed for declaring the school’s action of withholding the report card and denying promotion as “illegal”.
He sought directives to the school management to submit its balance sheet and clarify about tax paid by it against receipt of term and miscellaneous fees for academic year 2020-21.
Bansod also demanded that the fees should be waived for last session due to Covid-19 pandemic and it should be revised in consultation with parents.The petitioner, through counsel Ravi Sanyal, further sought directives to reduce the fees by Rs40,000 and charge only Rs46,800 as tuition fees as directed by the government.Terming the school’s action as arbitrary, the petitioner said he had no other option but to approach the HC after state school education department failed to provide any relief to the student during the pandemic.In a nutshellDhairya was in the school for 3 years after being admitted in pre-primary sectionIn March 2020, all schools had stopped functioning due to Covid-19 pandemicAll students including him were promoted to KG-I without any assessmentSchool started online coaching through Google classrooms in July last yearIt didn’t give any idea about fees to parents as online coaching was underwayOn March 13 this year, school asked parents to pay Rs86,800 in five daysOn March 26, school discontinued online classes of Dhairya for want of feesOn April 3, his parents paid Rs46,800 fees to escape coercive actionWhen Dhairya’s results were withheld despite paying fees, he moved the HC