The High Court of Karnataka on Wednesday asked the State government to continue the process of selecting students for admission under the RTE Act quota to private schools and complete the process at the earliest.
A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Subhro Kamal Mukherjee and Justice Ravi Maliamath passed the order while disposing of a public interest litigation petition, filed by Adarsh R. Iyer, co-president of the Janaadhikaara Sangharsha Parishath, complaining about rejection of 86,154 applications owing to a lapse in the online verification process.
Observing that the State government had taken all possible steps to contact the parents of all the 86,154 children to approach the authorities for physical verification of documents to overcome the lapse in the online process, the Bench said that no further order was essential in the present case.
The government had said that it sent 32 lakh SMSs to all the phone numbers provided by the 86,154 applicants besides issuing notices through print and electronic media inviting them for physical verification of documents.
However, only around 10,000 parents turned up for physical verification of documents, and applications of around 8,000 among them were found to be in order, the government had said.