SC notice to CBSE on contempt plea alleging violation of order on fees

A bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi, Navin Sinha and K M Joseph asked the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) to respond to the plea within six weeks.

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to the CBSE on a plea seeking contempt action against the board for allegedly "disobeying" the top court's order and charging exorbitant fees of up to Rs. 1,200 from students for obtaining copies of evaluated answer-sheets. A bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi, Navin Sinha and K M Joseph asked the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) to respond to the plea within six weeks. The contempt plea has alleged that the CBSE has wilfully and deliberately disobeyed the directions of the apex court, which had in 2016 said that the board should 'scrupulously' follow its 2011 verdict holding that the students have the fundamental and legal right to access their evaluated answer-sheets under the Right to Information Act. It has claimed that despite the apex court's direction, the CBSE had published 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. The petition has claimed that as per the court's direction, the fee prescribed under the 2012 RTI Rules should be charged from the students for obtaining the answer-sheets. It 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 plea has also sought a direction to the CBSE to provide copies of evaluated answer-sheets to the examinee's only as per provisions of the RTI Act, 2005 and at the fees prescribed under 2012 Rules.