SANDIP HARSHADRAY MUNJYASARA Vs. STATE OF GUJARAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This Writ Petition is filed in the nature of Public Interest Litigation espousing the public cause wherein the petitioner has sought changes to the Algorithm / Program / Logic / Source Code of the Web Portal so that the Portal can detect and identify the actual eligible schools which should appear in the list of eligible schools within the radius of 01 Km, 01 03 Kms. and 03 06 Kms. in relation to the students residential address. The petitioner has further sought direction against the respondentauthorities to declare the total number of seats filled-in by the schools in the previous year and the available number of seats to be filled-in during this year with each registered schools on the Web Portal. It is also prayed that a High Level Committee be constituted, including the Forensic, Technical and Legal Experts to carry out forensic investigation on the Web Portal and to submit a report of the same before this Court.

(2.) It is the case of the petitioner that as per Section 12(1)(c) of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 [hereinafter referred to as "the Act of 2009" for short], a school specified in sub-clauses (iii) and (iv) of Section-2(n) of the Act shall admit in Standard-1 to the extent of at least 25% of the strength of that class children belonging to the weaker sections and disadvantaged group in the neighborhood and provide free and compulsory elementary education till its completion. It is the case of the petitioner that thereafter, the Government issued the Resolution dated 23.05.2013 for the purpose of grant of admission under the Act of 2009. Under Clause 4 of the said Resolution, admission procedure for free seats is prescribed. Clause 4(KH) provides that the total number of seats at the entry level or any other classes must not be less than the total number of seats in the school.

(3.) As per the case of the petitioner, the respondents have released the schedule of Online 25% admission policy 2017-2018. When the petitioner has personally visited the Web Portal, he found out deceptive data base on the URL : www .rtegujarat.org/home/schoollist. The petitioner, therefore, made representation to the respondent no.2 on 21.02.2017. It is stated that the second column, namely, the Standard-1 strength and 25% of Standard-1 strength were removed from the Web Page of the Web Portal just to hide the previous mistake. The petitioner therefore, once again made representation on 02.03.2017 to the respondents.