The city police on Tuesday told the High Court of Karnataka that they have registered FIRs against principals/heads of 186 schools — 161 private and 25 government ones — for not implementing financially viable norms among the safety guidelines issued following the rape of a six-year-old student of a private school in July.
The cases were booked under Section 188 of the IPC after inspecting schools as per direction of the HC.
However, the court said that the government cannot escape from implementing the safety norms. It cannot impose the guidelines on private schools unless they are enforced in schools run by the BBMP and the government itself.
“The government should set an example in implementing the safety norms. Private schools will take exception if the government fails to enforce them in its schools,” observed Justice A.N. Venugopala Gowda while noticing that a large number of schools run by the government and the BBMP in the jurisdiction of the city police have not implemented the safety norms.
‘Impractical norms’The court made the observations while hearing petitions filed by the Karnataka Private School Joint Action Committee and others, who had termed some of the norms as ‘impractical’ and seeking direction for redressal of their grievances on difficulties faced in enforcing the norms.
In the interim report, as sought by the court, the city police stated that of the 2,727 schools in their jurisdiction, 273 private and four government schools have adhered to all the guidelines issued on July 27.
However, 223 private, 298 government and eight BBMP schools have not enforced any of the norms while pointing out that 1,921 schools (1604 private, 279 government and 38 BBMP) have partially implemented the norms.
The court adjourned further hearing to Wednesday while summoning an official of the BBMP to seek an explanation on non-implementation of norms.
