Supreme Court stays admissions to engineering colleges through JEE over 'grace marks'
The Supreme Court on Friday put on hold admissions to various engineering colleges in the country, including the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) and NITs over the issue of bonus marks in the joint entrance examination (JEE).
- Jul 7, 2017,
- Updated Jul 7, 2017 7:47 PM IST
The Supreme Court on Friday put on hold admissions to various engineering colleges in the country, including the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) and NITs over the issue of bonus marks in the joint entrance examination (JEE).
The order, which is expected to postpone the counselling process and affect scores of engineering aspirants, came after a petition was filed by some students for giving 'grace marks' to candidates after an error in the Hindi version of the question papers had appeared.
Officials had given bonus marks to all candidates irrespective of whether the student attempted the question or not.
The petitioners had appealed for a fresh merit list and cancellation of the merit list announced for the JEE (Advanced).
A bench of Justices Dipak Misra and A M Khanwilkar will hear the case in detail on Monday. Meanwhile, the bench also restrained the high courts from entertaining any writ petition relating to counselling and admissions to the IITs.
However, the joint admission board of the IITs had asked for the dismissal of the petition saying that a panel of experts had decided to give bonus marks after considering various options. The order will halt further counselling and admissions to Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) in respect of JEE (Advanced) exam.
Around 1.7 lakh candidates had registered for the advanced-level examination after clearing an initial screening test. There are 36,000 seats in 97 institutes under the joint seat allocation programme for state-run engineering colleges including the National Institute of Technology and IITs.
On June 30, the apex court had issued notice to the Ministry of Human Resource Development on a plea seeking quashing of the IIT-JEE 2017 rank list.
The petition, filed by IIT aspirant Aishwarya Agarwal, had sought the court's direction to declare that the action of awarding "bonus marks" to the candidates who had appeared in the JEE (Advanced) 2017 examination was wrong and violated her right, as well as that of other students.
It also sought a direction for preparation of the all- India rank list after rectifying the scores of JEE (Advanced) and also award marks for the incorrect questions to the candidates who had attempted the right answers.
As an alternative, the petitioner said the institution should conduct fresh examination and prepare a fresh merit list or grant all students another opportunity to appear in the examination to be conducted next year.
The petition also sought an interim stay on the merit list and the counselling, saying it would cause serious prejudice to the petitioner and other deserving candidates.
The Supreme Court on Friday put on hold admissions to various engineering colleges in the country, including the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) and NITs over the issue of bonus marks in the joint entrance examination (JEE).
The order, which is expected to postpone the counselling process and affect scores of engineering aspirants, came after a petition was filed by some students for giving 'grace marks' to candidates after an error in the Hindi version of the question papers had appeared.
Officials had given bonus marks to all candidates irrespective of whether the student attempted the question or not.
The petitioners had appealed for a fresh merit list and cancellation of the merit list announced for the JEE (Advanced).
A bench of Justices Dipak Misra and A M Khanwilkar will hear the case in detail on Monday. Meanwhile, the bench also restrained the high courts from entertaining any writ petition relating to counselling and admissions to the IITs.
However, the joint admission board of the IITs had asked for the dismissal of the petition saying that a panel of experts had decided to give bonus marks after considering various options. The order will halt further counselling and admissions to Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) in respect of JEE (Advanced) exam.
Around 1.7 lakh candidates had registered for the advanced-level examination after clearing an initial screening test. There are 36,000 seats in 97 institutes under the joint seat allocation programme for state-run engineering colleges including the National Institute of Technology and IITs.
On June 30, the apex court had issued notice to the Ministry of Human Resource Development on a plea seeking quashing of the IIT-JEE 2017 rank list.
The petition, filed by IIT aspirant Aishwarya Agarwal, had sought the court's direction to declare that the action of awarding "bonus marks" to the candidates who had appeared in the JEE (Advanced) 2017 examination was wrong and violated her right, as well as that of other students.
It also sought a direction for preparation of the all- India rank list after rectifying the scores of JEE (Advanced) and also award marks for the incorrect questions to the candidates who had attempted the right answers.
As an alternative, the petitioner said the institution should conduct fresh examination and prepare a fresh merit list or grant all students another opportunity to appear in the examination to be conducted next year.
The petition also sought an interim stay on the merit list and the counselling, saying it would cause serious prejudice to the petitioner and other deserving candidates.