Padam Mehta v. State of Rajasthan
Supreme Court of India2026 INSC 476Bench: Justice Vikram Nath and Justice Sandeep Mehta
The Supreme Court held that the right to receive education in one's mother tongue is an intrinsic and inseparable facet of the freedom of speech and expression guaranteed under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution, and is equally a component of the right to quality education flowing from Article 21A. The Bench reasoned that the freedom of expression is not confined to the act of speaking; it necessarily presupposes the antecedent ability to receive, understand and assimilate information, which is impossible where the medium of instruction is alien to the learner. The Court observed that the imposition of a linguistically foreign medium upon young children, particularly in early schooling, inflicts what it described as a 'cruel strain' on the child and reduces the educative process to mechanical rote learning, thereby defeating the very object of Article 21A which contemplates 'quality' and not merely formal, education. The State's technical reliance on the absence of Rajasthani from the Eighth Schedule was rejected as constitutionally insufficient because the Eighth Schedule is not exhaustive of the linguistic identities that the State is bound to respect under the constitutional scheme of cultural and educational rights read with Articles 29 and 350A. The State of Rajasthan was accordingly directed to move beyond its passive posture and proactively recognise Rajasthani as a regional language for educational purposes in both government and private schools, frame appropriate curricular and pedagogical policy, and ensure that children whose home language is Rajasthani are not disadvantaged at the foundational stage of learning.