Class 1 student can’t be denied admission for falling short of age criterion by ‘a day’: HC

The HC has pronounced an “absolute” rule on aggregating the age of students while hearing a petition filed by a Vadodara-based parent whose son had been asked to repeat senior kindergarten as he was short of turning six years by one day on June 1, 2023.

Upholding a 2016 case law of a Supreme Court judgment in Yusufbhai Mamadbhai Dabawala vs Director of Primary Education Gujarat State & Others, the single judge bench of Justice Sangeeta K Vishen granted the petition of Vadodara-based parent Hari Om Bhatt whose son was born on June 1, 2017, and was asked to repeat the year in Sr KG as he fell short of completing six years of age by one day. The 2016 case law is of a case in which the petitioner’s ward, born June 1, 2011, was falling short of the then-mandatory five years of age by one day for admission into a school.

Allowing the petition, Justice Vishen said, “The rule made is absolute. The respondents are therefore directed to consider the case of the son of the petitioner and grant admission and not deny the admission only on the ground that the son of the petitioner has not completed six years of age on June 1, 2023.”

The Gujarat HC has widely quoted the 2016 case law, which relied on the Mimansa rules of interpretation instead of the Maxwell Principles of Interpretation of law. The HC quoted the case law as saying, “It is complained that Mimansa principles have been forgotten to be applied in the judicial dispensation by the constitutional courts. The Maxwell method of interpretation can be said to be search-bound, whereas the Mimansa principles are solution-oriented… One of the Mimansa Principles is Gunapradhan Axiom, wherein “Guna” means subordinate or accessory while “Pradhan” means principal.”

The HC said in its nine-page order, “In the present case, it is not in dispute that the date of birth of the son of the petitioner is 01.06.2017 and therefore, would be completing six years but with a shortage of one day. In the aforesaid judgment, this Court, applying the principle of interpretation held that when any word or group of words in the statute are capable of being supplied two alternative interpretations, essentially leading to the same meaning, and when, without doing violence to the words or without deviating from the object, rather in order to endear the object of the word in the statute or the object of the statute or rule in general, it is possible to accord alternative meaning, such alternative meaning should be applied to make the provision of law or rule purposive. ”

Further citing the case law applied in the current petition of the Vadodara parent, the court said, “If a word or sentence purporting to express a subordinate idea clashes with the principal idea, the former must be adjusted to the latter or must be disregarded altogether.”

The court also applied the 2016 case law’s explanation of the “concept of years” as per the Gunapradhan Axiom, which states, ” it emphasises completion of a certain number of years five years [in the case of the 2016 petition]. By necessary implication the object of the rulemaking authority is that a child to be imparted education at the completion of age, that should be mature enough to go to the school, thus to be admitted to the school. The prescription of the date of June 1 has provided a kind of yardstick to be applied for considering the completion of five years.”

Advocate Hitesh Gupta, who appeared for Bhatt in the HC, said the HC judgment would provide relief to many parents whose petitions are now pending before the HC. “There are a total of 55 petitions of parents from Vadodara and one from Ahmedabad that will be heard on June 12. We are hopeful that the court will provide relief to the parents in the case,” Gupta said.

Close to three lakh students of senior KG in Gujarat are likely to have to repeat one year of school in order to comply with the new government directive regarding the completion of six years of age on June 1 for admission to Class I of the current academic year.