GRACY MATHUR (MINOR) Vs. STATE OF RAJASTHAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This writ petition has been filed by 108 students of the respondent No. 6-school who were aggrieved by the increase in the fees payable by them. It is argued that fees was increased as recently as the previous academic session i.e. 2018-19 also, but now in the very next year i.e. academic session 2019-20 again the substantial increase in the amount of fees has been made.

(2.) Learned counsel for the petitioners has invited attention of the Court towards the statement showing the fee with respect to the eight different academic sessions starting from 2012-13 upto 2019-20 and submits that there has been a substantial increase in the fees each year in utter violation of the provisions of Rajasthan Schools (Regulation of Fee) Act, 2016. The respondent-school have not adhered to the provisions of Sec. 4 of the Act, which requires that fee shall be increased only on recommendation of the School Level Fee Committee consisting of the representative of management of school, three teachers nominated by management and also five parents from the Parent- Teachers Association. Sec. 6(3) requires that after considering all the relevant factors laid down under Sec. 8, the School Level Fee Committee shall approve the fee within a period of thirty days from the date of receipt of the details of the proposed fee and the record under sub-sec. (2) of Sec. 6. The details of the fee so approved by the Committee shall be displayed on the notice board in Hindi, English and in the respective medium of school, and if such school has its own website, it shall be displayed on the same and further that such revised fee shall be binding for three academic years.

(3.) It is argued that neither five parents, who were supposed to be Members of the School Level Fee Committee were ever informed of the meeting of such Committee, nor any such recommendation was obtained from them. The respondent-school has also not adhered to the requirement of maintaining the fee, once revised, for next three academic years as per Sec. 6(3) of the Act of 2016 and has been increasing fee by about 10% to 15% each succeeding year for last seven years.