Supreme Court issues notice to CBSE for fee violation order

The Supreme Court issued a notice to the CBSE on Monday based on a plea seeking contempt action against the board for allegedly “disobeying” the top court’s order. The plea also states that the board charges exorbitant fees of up to Rs 1,200 from students for obtaining copies of evaluated answer-sheets.

Hearing the petition, the apex court headed by Justices Ranjan Gogoi, Navin Sinha and K M Joseph, asked the board to respond within six weeks. According to the plea, CBSE had wilfully and deliberately disobeyed the Supreme Court’s 2016 order which stated that the board should follow its 2011 verdict. In that verdict, the apex court had observed that students have the fundamental and legal right to access their evaluated answer-sheets under the Right to Information Act.

The plea states that despite the order, the board issued a notification prescribing fee of Rs 1,000 and Rs 1,200 for students of Class 10th and 12th respectively to obtain the evaluated answer-sheets, reports India Today. The plea also states that the only the fess should be charged form the students that have been prescribed under the 2012 RTI Rules.

The petitioner in the plea sought setting aside of the CBSE notification prescribing fee of Rs. 1,000 and Rs. 1,200 for the students for obtaining copies of the evaluated answer-sheets. The petition states that the fee should be charged according to the provisions of the RTI Act, 2005 and at the fees prescribed under 2012 Rules.

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