RTE Act: Supreme Court notice to centre after Tamil Nadu challenges HC’s EWS quota reimbursement ruling

The Supreme Court has issued a notice to the centre after the Tamil Nadu government challenged a Madras High Court order that forced the state to bear the full cost of reimbursing private schools for admissions made under the Right to Education (RTE) Act.

The apex court has given four weeks to the Union government to file replies on the Special Leave Petition (SLP) against the June 10 High Court judgement that made Tamil Nadu solely responsible for paying private schools under the RTE’s 25% Economically Weaker Section (EWS) quota for the 2025-26 academic year.

The High Court directed the State to initiate the process, release reimbursements to private schools under Section 12(2), and consider delinking the RTE component from Samagra Shiksha, the centrally sponsored education scheme through which funds are disbursed.

The Madras High Court judgment was delivered by Justices GR Swaminathan and V Lakshminarayanan.

RTE Act EWS quota: Tamil Nadu case

The Tamil Nadu government has accused the centre of withholding Rs 342.69 crore – its 60% share – of private school reimbursements for EWS students admitted under Section 12(1)(c) of the RTE Act during the 2021–22 and 2022–23 academic years.

Senior Advocate P. Wilson, representing the state, informed the Supreme Court that the High Court “erred in ruling that only the State is primarily responsible for these expenditures”.

“Section 7 envisages a concurrent responsibility to both central government and the state government for providing funds for the implementation of the provisions of the Act.”

The state has been forced to cover the entire expenditure since 2021 reimbursing Rs. 364.43 crore in 2021-22 and Rs 383.59 crore in 2022-23 to ensure uninterrupted reimbursements to private schools, Wilson submitted.

Tamil Nadu’s SLP states that the High Court expanded the scope of the writ petition and imposed financial obligations without reconciling them with the statutory funding structure.

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RTE Act: Tamil Nadu argument in Supreme Court

The union government has withheld funds for the Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan, funded by both centre and state in a 60:40 ratio, because Tamil Nadu has not implemented the PM SHRI scheme which converts existing public schools into model institutions that have implemented the National Education Policy 2020.

Tamil Nadu has opposed the NEP 2020, adopting its own State Education Policy for schooling, and is one of three states to not sign an agreement to set up PM SHRI schools.

But the financial stakes continued to escalate. For 2024-25 academic year, the Project Approval Board (PAB) approved total Samagra Shiksha expenditure of Rs 3,585.99 crore, with the Union government’s share at Rs 2,151.59 crore and the state’s at Rs 1,434.39 crore. The RTE component for that year was Rs 622.51 crore, of which Rs 256.17 crore was earmarked for 25% seat reimbursements.

For 2025–26, the PAB approved Rs 3,078.70 crore, with the Union’s share at Rs. 1,847.22 crore and the State’s at Rs. 1,231.48 crore. The RTE component for that year was Rs. 585.31 crore, with Rs. 314.98 crore designated for reimbursements.

The SLP records the State’s calculation that the reimbursement burden represents 41.15% of the RTE component for 2024–25 and 53.81% for 2025–26, and that the reimbursement for 2025–26 amounts to 28.81% of the state’s approved share for that year.

The SLP was filed on August 7, 2025, through counsel Sabharish Subramanian.

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Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan funds, NEP

Tamil Nadu has also filed an original suit under Article 131 of the Constitution against the Union of India, challenging the alleged linkage of Samagra Shiksha funds to implementation of the National Education Policy and seeking the release of Rs 2,291.30 crore with interest. That suit, filed on May 20, 2025, remains pending.

The parliamentary standing committee on education, in its March 2025 report, acknowledged the non-disbursal of funds and recommended immediate release of the pending amounts.