Online Education : Karnataka High Court Issues Notice On PIL Asking State Govt To Provide Laptops/Tablets To EWS Category Students

A division bench of Justice B V Nagarathna and Justice N S Sanjay Gowda issued the notice while hearing a petition filed by A. A. Sanjeev Narrain, Arvind Narrain and Murali Mohan.

The petition states that the respondents in not providing adequate online resources to school children prior to resumption of online classes, is violative of Article 21-A read with the provisions of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education, 2009 ("RTE Act") read with the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Rules, 2010 ("RTE Rules") read with the Karnataka Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Rules, 2012 ("Karnataka RTE Rules").

Allowing the resumption of online classes and simultaneously not providing sufficient resources to disadvantaged and economically weaker school children creates an unreasonable classification whereby only a small percentage of school children are able to attend these online classes and a vast majority of school children are unable to attend the same thereby violating Article 14 of the Constitution of India.

Senior Advocate Harish Narsappa appearing for the petitioners relied on the order dated July 8, of the High Court in which it directed the State Government to withdraw the Order banning online classes and held that schools could resume online classes. It was also observed in the said order that the State Government will have to take appropriate steps to create an infrastructure by which the facility of online education can be extended even to students in rural areas.

Narsappa submitted that despite the aforesaid observation by the Court, the Respondent No.1 has not provided adequate facilities to school children to ensure that they are able to participate in these online classes.

The petition relied on a report released by the The National Statistical Office (NSO) of the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, on the household social consumption on education in India for the period July 2017-June 2018.

The report indicates that in Karnataka, for rural households, only a dismal 2% of households have access to a computer and only 8.3% of households have access to internet facilities. For urban households, only 22.9% of households have access to a computer and 33.5% of households have access to internet facilities.

It is also stated that the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in several job losses and severe loss of opportunities in both rural and urban households and school children belonging to these households would not have any means to access classes held online.

The plea also relies on judgement of the Delhi High Court dated September 18, 2020 in the case of Justice for All v. Government of Delhi & Others, ("Justice for All case").

The petition prays for:

1. An appropriate writ, order or direction to respondents to ensure that free laptops, tablets, computers and high speed internet or any other equipment required for online classes be provided free of cost to every child defined under Section 2(c) of the RTE Act except fee paying children with immediate effect;
2. An appropriate writ, order or direction to respondents to ensure that disadvantaged children and children belonging to the economically weaker section as defined under the RTE Act, studying in private schools not face any barrier in terms of accessing and attending online classes; 25
3. Pass an appropriate order directing the Respondent No.4 to withdraw a letter dated July 29, 2020 issued by Respondent No.4 and published by Respondent No.2 and any other circulars and letters issued by Respondent No.4 directing the compulsory deployment of school teachers for COVID-19 duties.