New Delhi, February 26 The formation of a school-level fee regulation committee (SLFRC) is a "massive undertaking" that cannot be completed within 10 days for the upcoming academic session starting April 1, the Delhi Public School (DPS) Society told the Delhi High Court on Thursday.
A bench of Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya and Justice Tejas Karia was hearing petitions by several schools' associations challenging a February 1 notification by the Delhi government asking schools to set up the SLFRC within 10 days.
Seeking a stay, senior counsel Puneet Mittal, appearing for the DPS Society, argued that according to the Delhi School Education (Transparency in Fixation and Regulation of Fees) Act, the selection of five parents for the SLFRC must be done through a public draw of lots in the school premises after due notice, and this cannot be rushed.
"We have 25,000 students in Delhi. So, this is a massive undertaking. It is not something that can be done in a few days. It is not intended to be done that way. It involves a lot of resources, and this can certainly wait," he argued.
Mittal also emphasized that while the SLFRC must include at least one member from the scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, or socially and educationally backward classes, the schools had no such data, as there was no mandate for them to maintain such records.
"In school, from elementary to higher secondary education, there is no question asked at any stage about your religion or caste. We only admit students in Delhi based on a point-based system," he explained.
The counsel said that the schools also had children of other nationalities, and collecting data on the caste of students could not be done in a short period of time.
"All this needs to be done within 10 days, as per the February 1 notification. Is this possible? Is it not a massive undertaking? What was the urgency?" he asked.
The court will hear the matter again on February 27.
The Delhi government had earlier told the court that private schools cannot collect fees from April 1 for the new academic session unless it is determined and approved according to the new fee regulation law.
In its response to the petitions, the Directorate of Education has said that if the Act is not allowed to be implemented from April 1, it would defeat the purpose of the Act, i.e., to prevent profiteering and have regulated fees from the beginning of the 2026-27 academic year.
The Action Committee Unaided Recognised Private Schools, an umbrella body of private schools in Delhi, has contended that the February 1 notification was legally unsustainable as it changed the timeline prescribed in the Act and it was "practically impossible" to complete the process for the upcoming academic session.
On February 1, the Delhi government issued a gazette notification to "facilitate" the implementation of the Delhi School Education (Transparency in Fixation and Regulation of Fees) Act after the Supreme Court raised questions about its new fee fixation law.
According to the notification, every school was directed to constitute an SLFRC within 10 days of the publication of the order.
The Gazette further said that school managements must submit details of the proposed fee structure for the next three academic years starting from 2026-27 within 14 days of forming the SLFRC, after which the committee will proceed to fix the fees according to the provisions of the Act.