The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to the Centre and all States on a writ petition for a directive that children living with, or affected by, HIV/AIDS be not denied admission to, or expelled from, schools.
A Bench of Justices B.S. Chauhan and J. Chelameswar also served notice on the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights.
In its petition, the Naz Foundation said children were “being denied their fundamental right to education with alarming regularity,” just because they were HIV-positive or their parents/guardians were afflicted. They were denied admission to, and suspended and even expelled from school. “They have also been publicly ridiculed by school authorities, humiliated and treated unfairly to the extent that they have been segregated from other children and made to clean toilets and classrooms.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Moreover, “the confidentiality of HIV-positive status of the children has been routinely breached. This led to violation of their right to privacy and the rampant acts of stigmatisation that followed undermined their dignity.”