Chandigarh, Sept. 13 -- The Punjab and Haryana high court has said that Punjab's disobedience of the implementation of Right to Education (RTE) provisions in the state's private schools appears to be 'wilful' and has sought a timeline from the government on action taken by it for implementation of February 19 orders passed by it. On February 19, this year, the high court ordered all private unaided schools to reserve 25% of class 1 seats for students from the economically weaker section and directed the state to ensure compliance from the 2025-26 session as mandated under the Central law enacted 15 years ago. However, as the order was not complied with, KS Raju Legal Trust, on whose petition the February 19 order had come, filed a contempt petition in the high court in July alleging wilful disobedience by the state government. Responding to the contempt plea, the state's secretary, school education, Anindita Mitra, had claimed that the necessary notification for the implementation was carried out on March 20 and instructions were issued to all district education officers for implementation of the same. It was further submitted that a standard operating procedure (SOP) was issued for the implementation of the EWS quota on August 14. Mitra further claimed that the court order stood "complied with". However, a delay has occurred in implementation, which is neither "intentional nor deliberate." After going through the affidavit, the bench of justice Vikram Aggarwal observed that, prima facie, there has been "wilful disobedience of February 19 orders by the state. "Before proceeding further, the state of Punjab is directed to file an additional affidavit giving the timeline of the action taken pursuant to the order dated 19.02.2025," the court ordered, asking the government to do the needful within one week and posted the matter for further hearing on September 24. A central government enactment, the RTE Act, 2009, has been implemented countrywide. However, in 2011, the Punjab government notified rules, in contravention of the central law, which resulted in preventing children from weaker sections from accessing private unaided schools. Notably, in July, the high court also issued notice to Punjab on a plea from the same petitioner demanding a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into alleged lapses in the implementation of Right to Education (RTE) provisions by private schools in the state....