CBSE told to hold AIPMT,declare results by Aug 17

Published on:

20 Jun 2015, 12:00 am

Rejecting plea of the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) for three months time to re-conduct the All India Pre-Medical Test-2015 (AIPMT-20015), the Supreme Court on Friday asked it to wrap up the entire process and declare the results by August 17, 2015. Early this week, the SC had cancelled the AIPMT-20015 conducted on May 5 following charges of irregularities. The CBSE on Thursday had told the court that it would be “impossible” for it to re-conduct in four weeks the scrapped exam as earlier directed by the apex court in its June 15 order. The Friday order came on a petition by CBSE for extension of time to conduct the AIPMT afresh. The court, while quashing the AIPMT-2015 on June 15 on the ground of large-scale irregularities, had asked CBSE to re-conduct the exam within four weeks.

Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for CBSE, told a Bench of Justices RK Agrawal and AM Sapre that four weeks time is insufficient for re-conducting the examination. Rohatgi said the exam would be conducted around 1,000 centres. He said that the board needs time to prepare the question papers again. A large number of schools would be required for the exam. There is shortage of teachers, invigilators and para-military forces,” he said.

During the hearing, Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for Medical Council of India (MCI), which conducts counselling, urged CBSE to

squeeze its time period and hold the examinations within the period decided by the apex court.

“We are not in adversarial litigation. We are only concerned with future of the students. If the deadline is not maintained, only state quota seats would be filled. Thus there will be two parallel batches for the same course which will affect future post-graduate admissions and ultimately students will suffer,” he said.

The Bench said, “Work out the things together as you are sailing in the same boat. We have got genuine difficulty and we cannot do away with the dispute.”

Earlier, the court had said that the examination stands vitiated even if one student is being benefited illegally.

It had said that CBSE could not be held guilty as such but taking into consideration the past incidents, “CBSE ought to have been cognisant of these things”.

The CBSE, however, had opposed the contentions seeking cancellation of the test, saying, “6.3 lakh students cannot be made to take the exam afresh when only 44 students have been found involved in taking benefits through unfair means.” CBSE was to declare the results of AIPMT, appeared by over six lakh students in May this year, on June 5 but it was stayed by the Supreme Court.