By Express News Service

NEW DELHI: Going against the Supreme Court order that Aadhaar is no longer mandatory for school admissions, some private schools in the national capital are making it compulsory at the time of providing documents for admissions. In notifications issued on their websites, at least two schools have made Aadhaar cards of students mandatory in the list of documents required at the time of admissions for nursery, kindergarten (KG) and class one.

The Supreme Court, in its September order, had held that the 12-digit unique identification number will not be required for National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) and other exams conducted by the University Grants Commission (UGC), the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), and for school admissions.

As per the website of St Mary School in Dwarka and MBS, Dwarka, the institution has asked for Aadhaar along with the birth certificate and address proofs of the child.“This is in contempt of court guidelines,” said Sumit Vohra, founder of admissionsnursery.com, an online portal for the parent community, which has been receiving complaints regarding the same issue.In the last admission season, many parents had complained of hassles faced by them when they could not provide the identification card for their ward.

The admission to nursery and other entry-level classes in approximately 1,700 private schools started this month. As per the schedule released by the Delhi government’s Directorate of Education (DoE), the schools will have to come out with application forms and release the admission criteria online by December 14 for the process to start from December 15. However, with only two more days to go, only a handful of schools have uploaded the details online yet.

For the first time, the Delhi government has fixed an upper age limit for admission to entry level classes.

As per a circular on November 28 by DoE, the maximum age for admission in nursery, KG, and class one, will be four, five, and six years as on March 31, 2019, respectively. So far, only the minimum age was specified.