Petition filed in SC against Assam law on switching state-funded madrassas to government schools

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• May 31, 2022 | Dhupali Das

Md Imad Uddin Barbhuiya and others sought a stay on the High Court ruling in an appeal filed on February 4.  

Digital Desk: On Tuesday, a petition was filed in the Supreme Court against the Gauhati High Court's ruling upholding the Assam Repealing Act, 2020, which mandates the conversion of all provincialized (government-funded) Madrassas into regular schools in Assam.

On February 4, the High Court rejected a petition contesting the Act's legitimacy, stating that the changes brought about by the State's legislative and administrative action are only for provincialized Madrassas, which are government schools, and not for private or community schools.

Md Imad Uddin Barbhuiya and others sought a stay on the High Court ruling in an appeal filed on February 4.  

By the order issued on February 12, 2021, the Governor ousts the 'Assam State Madrasa Board,' which was established in 1954. It leads to an unjustified exercise of legislative and executive powers, as well as a rejection of the Madrassas' right to continue as centres of religious teaching and education, the petition stated. 

"A direct breach of Article 30(1A) of the Constitution is an infringement on the Madrassas' proprietary rights without payment of adequate compensation," it stated.

Moreover, they have revoked the Madrassas' right under Article 30(1) to "create" and "administer" educational institutions of their choice, including the ability to determine their own curriculum, which could be based on their perceptions of ways to preserve their religion or culture, it added.

Assam Madrassa Education (Provincialisation) Act, 1995, and Assam Madrassa Education (Provincialisation of Services of Teachers and Reorganisation of Educational Institutions) Act, 2018 were repealed by the Assam Repealing Act, 2020.

Even though the madrassas are minority educational institutions created by a religious minority to impart religious instruction as well as other categories of education to the people of India, within Assam, the petitioners claimed that the High Court ruling of February 4, 2022, would cause their closure and prevent them from admitting students for the old courses for this academic year.  

The petition against the state government's decision was rejected by the High Court, which stated that because Madrassas are government schools that are entirely maintained by the state through provincialization, they are covered by Article 28(1) of the Constitution and thus cannot impart religious instruction.