The Supreme Court on Monday asked the Central government to respond to Tamil Nadu government‘s plea against a Madras High Court order directing it to reimburse private schools under the Right to Education Act (RTE Act) for Economically Weaker Section (EWS) admissions despite non-payment by Union government [Government of Tamil Nadu vs. V. Eswaran].

A bench of Justice Vikram Nath and Justice Sandeep Mehta issued notice on State government’s plea and listed the matter for consideration on September 29.

"Issue notice returnable within four weeks," the Court ordered.

The High Court on June 10 ruled that the State government cannot cite non-receipt of Union funds to avoid its statutory liability under Section 12(2) of RTE Act and directed it to pay ₹314.98 crore to private schools for admissions under the EWS quota.

Senior advocate P Wilson, appearing for the Tamil Nadu government, contended that RTE Act places a concurrent responsibility on both the Union and State governments to provide financial support for implementation of the RTE Act.

He emphasised that Section 7 of the RTE Act clearly envisages a shared obligation, wherein both governments must contribute their respective portions to ensure effective enforcement of the law.

However, he pointed out that the Union government has not released its share of funds since 2021, thereby burdening the State exchequer and making it difficult for Tamil Nadu to meet the reimbursement obligations to private schools admitting students under the EWS quota.

In its plea, the State argued that the High Court exceeded the scope of the writ petition related to admission process under RTE Act and ruled on an issue not even raised before it.

It was contended that while Section 12(2) of the RTE Act, 2009 read with Rule 9 of the Tamil Nadu RTE Rules, 2011 places the obligation on the State government to reimburse private schools for expenses incurred in providing admissions under Section 12(1)(c), this responsibility is subject to the Central government performing its duties under Section 7 of the Act.

"The provisions of Section 12(2) are to be read with Section 7(2), 7(3) and 7(5) of RTE Act for affixing any such responsibility of the State Government. If the Section 12(2) is interpreted to be independent of the functions under Section 7 of the Act, it would lead to absolute absurdity and would make the Sections 7(1) and 7(3) of the Act unenforceable and nugatory," the petition said.

The petition was filed through advocate Sabarish Subramanian.

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