A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta said “good quality education” for children between the age of 6 and 14 years was a “fundamental right”. A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta said “good quality education” for children between the age of 6 and 14 years was a “fundamental right”.

Calling the “mushroom growth of CBSE schools” in Kerala an indication that public education system in the state left “something to be desired in terms of the quality”, the Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed a state government’s plea challenging a High Court order striking down the conditions for Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) affiliation as “arbitrary”.

A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta said “good quality education” for children between the age of 6 and 14 years was a “fundamental right”.

“Regulation of such education is permissible by law and not by executive fiat. Unfortunately, in this batch of petitions, the State of Kerala seeks to impose its authority over schools that provide apparently quality education, which is perceived to be a threat to the public education system in the State,” the bench said while dismissing petitions filed by the state government challenging the September 14, 2012 order of a Division Bench of the Kerala High Court.

Some school managements in the state had approached the High Court against the guidelines issued by the state in October 2011 for granting no objection certificates (NOC) to new schools for affiliation to CBSE and for existing schools for renewal of affiliation under the CBSE Affiliation Bye-Laws.

Disagreeing with the 2011 Kerala guidelines, the Supreme Court said, “Unfortunately, Kerala has not even thought of providing any such flexibility. It appears to us that the rigid requirement of Kerala indicates that it is imposed upon the schools that seek affiliation with the CBSE only with a view to unnecessarily burden them with an onerous and arbitrary condition.”

In a counter affidavit filed before the High Court, the state said the restrictions had been put in place on CBSE schools to prevent their mushrooming growth, which would affect the public education system in the state.

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