NEW DELHI: Supreme Court Thursday told Tamil Nadu govt that it needed to change its mindset towards teaching Hindi in schools and should thrash out issues with Centre on setting up Navodaya Vidyalayas in every district.As Vijay-led TN govt took the same stand taken by the previous DMK govt, a bench of Justices B V Nagarathna and A G Masih said individual states could not act like countries. “You have to change your mindset, it can’t be that Hindi will not be taught on the soil of TN,” the bench said.TN has been opposing the setting up of these schools as they follow a three-language policy, including Hindi, which is against the state’s two-language policy.“We are saying in addition to all the good things you’re doing in your state, having something in addition will not bring down your standards… People in Chennai should not alienate Delhi and vice versa,” SC said.Senior advocate Jaideep Gupta, appearing for the state, submitted it was against the federal structure to impose Centre’s decision on a state. “It is against the state policy. It supersedes Tamil. This kind of unification is not the purport of Constitution. It is not a central govt school. It is a school run by a society. There is an adamancy that Hindi must predominate,” he said.Gupta submitted that cooperative federalism would never work in only one direction and such a policy should not be enforced by the court.
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The bench asked the state to comply with its order and posted the case for further hearing in Dec. SC had last Dec directed TN to identify land required for establishing Navodaya Vidyalayas in each district within six weeks.“We are not asking you to acquire land. We are only asking you to identify it… There is a need for dialogue. You can’t say I won’t accept a policy. Today it is education, tomorrow it will be something else. You have to relax this rigidity in your mind,” SC said.The court was hearing TN’s plea challenging a Madras HC judgement directing it to set up Navodaya Vidyalayas in every district. HC had ruled that Navodaya Vidyalayas did not violate Tamil Nadu Tamil Learning Act and the state’s blanket refusal to set up such schools curtailed students’ right to choose educational institutions.