The Delhi high court on Saturday held that the provision in the city government’s February 2009 notification, stipulating unaided private schools to hike their fees only with the concurrence of their Parent-Teacher Associa-tion, is illegal.
While setting up a three-member panel on Friday to scrutinise the accounts of unaided private schools to determine the validity of the notification prescribing a fee hike slab, a division bench comprising Justices A.K. Sikri and Siddharth Mridul said, “The (PTA consultation) clause is clearly illegal and is not supported by any statutory or legal provision”.
The bench said the clause was also contrary to the provision of Section 17(3) of the Delhi Education Act, according to which, even the permission of the directorate of education is not required to hike the fee.
“Asking the schools to be at the mercy of PTAs for making further increase would clearly be contrary to the said provision. We, thus, hold that this clause is not valid,” the bench said in its 134-page judgment.
“Likewise, we are of the opinion that even the requirement of seeking approval of the school accounts by PTA would not hold water and is not legally valid,” it added.