COVID-19 has become a barrier for the exams in the country. Students from the various states have approached to the Supreme Court for the postponement or cancellation of different examination. But the central authorities still stand with their commitment to conduct exams. On 17thAugust, the Supreme Court of India dismissed the plea seeking postponement of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) and Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) which is scheduled to be held in the month of September, 2020. The bench while dismissing the petition said that the postponement of exams will put the career of students at peril and if exams will not held then students will lose an academic year which will be a loss to the country.
The Bench comprising Justice B.R Gavai, Arun Mishra and Krishna Murari was hearing a plea filed by 11 students from 11 states. It was submitted by the petitioners that the decision to conduct JEE and NEET exams in September 2020 at a time when the country is still fighting with COVID-19 is arbitrary, whimsical and violative of the Fundamental Right to life of lakhs of students. It was submitted in the Court that lakhs of young students are likely to appear in the aforesaid JEE and NEET examination in September. Meanwhile, Coronavirus cases are continuously increasing in the country at a rapid rate. This pandemic has already affected about 20 lakh people in India and the situation is worsening by every passing day. Conducting the aforesaid examinations at such perilous time is nothing else but putting lives of lakhs of young students at utmost risk and danger of disease. Advocate AlokhAlokSrivastava, appearing for the petitioners, submitted before Court that other exams like CA and CLAT have been cancelled, so NEET and JEE should also be cancelled. According to the notice released by the National Testing Agency (NTA) on July 3, the NEET UG exam will be conducted on Sep 13 and the JEE Main will commence on Sep 1 and conclude on Sep 6, 2020. The Bench said that the Court is not going to interfere with policy decisions of the authorities. It is further pointed out by the Bench that if demand was being made for resuming physical functioning of Courts then why examination can’t be held by taking necessary precautions. Tushar Mehta, Solicitor General, appearing for NTA ensured the Court that adequate precautions will be taken while conducting the exams.
On 18th August, ArvindDatar, Senior Advocate appearing on behalf of the state of Maharashtra, submitted before the Apex Court that University Grants Commission (UGC) can only lay down guidelines and standards for examination and cannot compel that exams should be held by a particular date.Datar submitted before the Court that uniform direction by UGC to hold exams without considering the local situation is arbitrary and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution. He also raised point about the lack of access for all the students to online exams. He asked how will students without access be able to give the exams and what about the students with disabilities. Datar also referred to the decision of Supreme Court in the Modern Dental College case to state that “Coordination and determination of standards” will not include right to conduct examination. On the arguments about the welfare of students, Justice Ashok Bhusan, the Presiding Judge of the Bench, observed that the students cannot decide their welfare. He said that“Only the authorities can decide what is in their welfare. Students are not competent enough to decide.”
In an another petition, State Government of Odisha has submitted before the Supreme Court that the University Grants Commission guidelines dated 06.07.2020 for mandatorily conducting final year examination is not implementable in the worsening condition of COVID-19 in the state of Odisha. This reply has been filed in a petition moved by YuvaSena, which had demanded that the UGC be directed to allow individual State Governments to pass the final year students based on their past performance. It was argued that examinations should not be conducted “just for the sake of conducting it”.
Rajeev Ranjan @ Samacharline