‘No question of interim protection’: Supreme Court refuses to pass order against CBSE’s three-language policy

The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to pass any interim order on a petition challenging the implementation of the CBSE’s three-language policy for Class 9 students from the 2026-27 academic session.A bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice V Mohana said it would not grant interim protection and ordered that the plea be tagged with similar petitions already pending before the court.“We cannot pass a single-line order today. This matter was argued at length. There is no question of interim protection,” the bench said.The petition was filed by NGO Friends of People for Active Democracy. During the hearing, the organisation’s counsel clarified that it was not challenging the three-language policy itself but only its implementation.In a lighter moment during the proceedings, Chief Justice Kant questioned the NGO’s name and asked whether such a nomenclature was intended to create fear in the minds of the court or the public.The counsel responded, “No, my lord. That’s the name of the trust. It’s an old trust set up in 2013.” The lawyer also told the court that CBSE was expected to issue detailed implementation guidelines by June 15.The bench, however, decided to hear the matter along with other related petitions and fixed July 14 as the next date of hearing.The case relates to a CBSE circular issued on May 15 as part of the board’s efforts to align its curriculum with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 and the National Curriculum Framework for School Education (NCF-SE) 2023.Under the policy, Class 9 students will be required to study three languages from July 1, 2026, with at least two of them being native Indian languages. Students who wish to study a foreign language can do so only as the third language after studying two Indian languages or as an additional fourth language.The CBSE has said that no board examination will be conducted for the third language (R3) in Class 10. Instead, all assessments will be school-based and internal. The performance of students will be reflected in their CBSE certificates, and no student will be prevented from appearing in the Class 10 board examinations because of R3.The board has also directed schools to update their third-language offerings on the OASIS portal by June 30. It said Class 6 R3 textbooks in 19 scheduled languages would be made available before July 1, while schools may use SCERT and state-level resources for other native Indian languages.To address teacher shortages, CBSE has allowed schools to temporarily use teachers from other subjects who have functional proficiency in the language concerned. It has also suggested measures such as inter-school resource sharing, virtual teaching support, engaging retired language teachers and appointing suitably qualified postgraduates.The board has further said that relaxations will be available for children with special needs under the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016. Foreign students returning to India may also receive exemptions on a case-by-case basis from the requirement of studying two native Indian languages.The Supreme Court had earlier, on May 27, agreed to examine the challenge and issued notices to the Centre, CBSE and NCERT. It had also sought a report on the board’s preparedness to implement the policy.