Tuesday, February 1 2005 17:17 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: In a fall-out of the infamous MMS case, Delhi Government today (Feb 1, 2005) banned mobile phones from all schools run and aided by it and advised public schools to follow its lead.

The decision to impose the ban was taken at a meeting of top Government and school officials called by State Education Minister Arvinder Singh Lovely in New Delhi.

The ban would apply to students and teachers of all Government-run or aided schools in the city and come into force with immediate effect, officials said.

Lovely said the decision was taken in view of complaints by parents and social organisations and to maintain discipline in schools.

The onus to ensure that the ban was enforced had been put on principals and a formal notification was likely to be issued in a day or two, the officials said.

The Government also decided to send advisory notes to the over one 1,000 public schools in the city asking them to ban mobile phones, but the present order did not apply to them.

Late last year, a widely circulated sexually explicit video clip of two students of a prominent public school shot on a mobile phone had shocked the nation.

The MMS clip had even been auctioned on popular website 'baazee.com'. A top official of the website and a student of Indian Institute of Technology in Kharagpur had been arrested in this connection.