School vehicles - A Judgement.

On Thursday, the 17the Dec.the Govt. of Tamil Nadu has assured the Hon'ble High Court Chennai that it would close down schools which were not authorized or where the granted authorization expired.

We have to read between the lines and take the substance from it.

For school vehicles we issue permits. The school authorities produce some letters etc etc. But we have to be more cautious in cases like this. It is our duty to see that the school is authorised by the Government to conduct the classes.

1. We may ask the school authorities to produce a certificate from education department that the school is authorised one. Because lot of nursery or middle schools function without recognition. Even in Vedaranyam incident the school has no recognition.

2. We may also write to the educational authorities before issuing the permit whether the school is a recognised one.

Already a public interest litigation has been filed by an activist for taking action against the transport department officials in a school van accident where many precious lives have been lost.

We may also make a check with reference to validity of permit of the vehicles. In many cases the permit has already expired and the vehicles are running as the school never knew that the permit has to be renewed. They see only when the school reopens in the May season. Out of ignorance the school fail to take notice of lapse of permit.

But the legal maxim is "IGNORANCE IS NOT AN EXCUSE".