Many from a group of 93 students, who passed Class 10 under CBSE, were not given admission to 11 grade.
The Madras High Court has ruled that a student who has completed Class 10 in a CBSE school cannot claim automatic admission to the 11th grade, if the school switches affiliation to a state board.
It also directed the state government to instruct all schools to notify admission norms in advance.
A high court division bench, comprising Justice Nooty Ramamohana Rao and Justice SS Sundar, gave the direction while allowing an appeal by a private school in Tuticorin district against a single judge order to admit a student to the appellant institution.
The bench said, if the school offered state board education for Class 11 and the student, who pursued his or her education under CBSE till the tenth grade, was ready to continue their education under state board, then his continuation can be considered.
"It is for the student to exercise the option to either continue in state board or CBSE. Yet, the student should apply afresh for admission, if he wants to continue," the bench said. The school contended that 93 students had passed the tenth grade under the CBSE system in 2015-16. Since the school offered only two groups with biology and mathematics as majors, all of them could not be accommodated according to the state government norms.
The court concurred with the argument of the student's counsel that the schools should have published the government rules in advance for admission to Class 11 so that pupils were not left disappointed.
The high court bench judges then directed the state government to instruct all schools to notify the norms for admission to Class 11 in advance.