Shillong, May 22: The Meghalaya High Court has directed St. Edmund’s School to restore the admission of a kindergarten student whose name was struck after he turned up late during the orientation programme.
The single bench of Justice Wanlura Diengdoh in a judgement today also directed the school to immediately allow the child to attend regular classes within one week.
“The action of the school authorities in cancellation of the child’s admission, calls for a mandamus to be issued,” the judgement said.
St Edmund’s School had granted the boy admission to their KG section. However, due to an illness the parents missed a notification that an induction programme would be held on December 13, 2025. The child only attended after the parents received a phone call from the school on the same day.
The father along with the child had attended the induction programme in the second half of the day even as the school denied their attendance. The court said it cannot be denied that the parents had sent an apology email to the school the next day with a request for consideration, but the missive was ever attended to by the school authorities.
The school without a show-cause notice cancelled the admission and ruled that it “stood forfeited in accordance with admission guidelines.”
The court said though the school authority stated that the induction programme is compulsory, there is nothing on record right from the stage of the initial admission process, wherein, it was clearly spelled out that there will be an induction programme, failure to attend the same, would result in automatic cancellation or forfeiture of the child’s admission.
“Under such circumstances, the action or inaction of the school authorities can only be termed as an action of arbitrariness and certainly a deprivation of natural justice to the parents and the child in question, falling within the reach of violation of the fundamental rights of the parents and the child as enshrined in Article 14 and 21A of the Constitution,” the court said.
