Source : livelaw.in
The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to entertain a plea seeking waiver of payment of exam fees for students of Class X & XII in wake of the pandemic situation. A bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan, R. Subhash Reddy & MR Shah stated that the appropriate authority should be approached. The plea arose seeking waiver in exam fee of students of classes 10 and 12 due to COVID-19 and financial problems faced by some parents. The petition was filed by an NGO 'Social Jurist' against a September 28 order of the Delhi High Court, seeking directions to CBSE to grant exemption from payment of CBSE Exams Fee in pandemic crisis to over 30 lakh class X and XII students of CBSE affiliated schools. Advocate Ashok Aggarwal told the Court that fee should at least be waived off for Government school students.
He also told Court that there had been a rise in the examination fee since last year. CBSE was charging only INR 375 from Class X and INR 600 from Class XII for exams earlier. In the current year 2020-21, CBSE has demanded Examination fee from Rs 1,500 to Rs 1,800 from students of class X and Rs 1,500 to Rs 2,400 from class XII students depending upon number of subjects, practical, etc, the plea stated.
The high court had asked Delhi Government and the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) to treat the PIL as a representation and then take a decision.
The high court's order has resulted in denial of relief to 30 lakh students in the country where as 3 lakh are in Delhi only.
The plea, filed through lawyer Ashok Agarwal, said either CBSE be asked to waive off the exams fee or the Centre should pay the money from the PM Cares Fund.