Legal challenge fizzles out, govt to go full throttle on school pairing

State govt to go ahead with merger of schools after HC dismisses back-to-back PILs challenging June 16 order

- HT Correspondent

In the face of criticism and teachers' protests, the Yogi Adityanath government will now go full steam ahead with its plan to merge low-enrolment schools with larger schools nearby as the legal challenge to the move has fizzled out with the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad high court dismissing back-to-back public interest litigations (PILs) against the pairing (merger) of schools.

The high court dismissed one PIL on July 7. On Thursday, a double judge bench of Justice AR Masoodi and Justice Sriprakash Singh dismissed a new PIL that challenged the June 16 order of the state government for the merger of primary schools run by the basic education department.

Chief standing counsel Shailendra Kumar Singh confirmed the dismissal of the new PIL. The new PIL filed by advocate Jyoti Rajput on Wednesday argued that this step (merger of schools) may adversely affect children from poor families living in remote villages.

According to the state government, no school will be shut down under this policy. Instead, schools will be upgraded -- one school may be designated for pre-primary, while another nearby may be upgraded to the primary or upper primary level.

The merger of schools will increase teacher availability and allow students to access libraries, laboratories, sports grounds, smart classrooms and more, the state government said in an official statement on Thursday.

The model is being run on the lines of private institutions offer ing pre-primary to higher classes on a single campus.

Why is school pairing necessary?