Can’t restrict schools from holding online classes: Madras high court

CHENNAI: The Madras high court on Monday refused to stay online classes for school students till the Centre frames guidelines for conduct of such classes.
A division bench of Justice M M Sundresh and Justice R Hemalatha refused to grant any interim relief, as additional solicitor-general of India R Sankaranarayanan informed the court that the Union government is in the process of framing the rules and is likely to publish them by July 15.
The issue pertains to pleas moved by S Saranya and M A Vimal Mohan to regulate conduct of such classes organised by private educational institutions. According to the petitioners, all educational institutions, under the guise of imparting education at the ease of home via online classes even during this pandemic, are pushing young students to great mental and physical suffering.
Due to such compulsory online classes from Classes I to XII, parents are forced to expose their children to smartphones and other similar gadgets with uninterrupted internet connectivity. Such exposure is hazardous to their physical health and mental development, the petitioners said.
“It is well established by ophthalmologists and doctors worldwide that continuous viewing of mobile phones is hazardous to eyes,” they claimed. The fact being so, exposing kids to six hours of continuous use of smartphones for online classes six days a week, and further more to complete tasks assigned to them by the school, is nothing but knowingly pushing the children to a world of blindness, he said.
Therefore, the petitioner wanted the court to direct the government to restrain such institutions from conducting classes online for more than 2 hours a day.