Patna High Court: A Division Bench comprising of Mukesh R. Shah CJ and Ashutosh Kumar, J. junked a Public Interest Litigation seeking direction for a change in school timings and a ‘no homework till class 8th’ policy, holding the issues raised in the petition to be too vague and general.
The present petition was filed praying for a writ of mandamus commanding the respondent to make provision for setting the timing of private schools from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and a direction to private/public schools to roll back the practice of giving home works at least till VIII standard. The case of the petitioner was that as the timing of private schools is from 7:30 a.m. to 8:00 a.m., the children have to get up early in the morning and, therefore the sleep of young students was being disturbed and it was ultimately affecting their health. Further, the petitioner avers that homework given to students was affecting their childhood. She relied on the report of World Health Organization titled ‘WHO Technical Meeting on Sleep and Health’ to support her contentions.
The respondent opposed the petition submitting that Rules of Affiliation had been framed keeping in mind the physical-cum-mental and emotional interests of children so that they get adequate rest, sleep and leisure in between their studies.
The Court held that petitioner was not entitled to any relief as prayed in the petition as her allegations and averments were too vague and general. It was opined that affiliation was granted to schools as per rules and there were certain guidelines which were required to be followed by every institution. Further, as far as school timings were concerned, it was for the concerned schools to fix their own timings.
In view of the above, the petition was dismissed.[Anju Mishra v. Union of India,2018 SCC OnLine Pat 2125, decided on 10-09-2018]
