The Supreme Court on Monday quashed the All India Pre-Medical and Pre-Dental Entrance Test (AIPMT) 2015 and ordered a fresh test within four weeks. The judgement will affect nearly 6.3 lakh aspirants. The court said that the examination has become a “suspect” and there “cannot be any compromise at any cost”.
The Vacation Bench of justices RK Agrawal and Amitava Roy said that the re-examination would cause inconvenience to many, but it was necessary to maintain the “impeccable and irrefutable” credibility of examination. “This is the price, the stakeholders would have to suffer,” the Bench said.
“We are not unaware that in holding the present examination as well as in participating in the exercise, all genuinely concerned have put in tireless efforts. All these, however, have been rendered futile by a handful of elements seeking to reap undue financial gain by subjecting the process to their evil manoeuvres.
“We have thus no hesitation to order that the All India Pre-Medical and Pre-Dental Test stands cancelled. The CBSE would now have to hold a fresh examination at the earliest...We direct the Board, in the attendant of facts and circumstances, to hold the examination within a period of four weeks from today,” the Bench said.
Rejecting the CBSE’s contention that the examination cannot be re-conducted in less than four months, the SC said the Board ought to “gear up” in full to hold the examination afresh at the earliest. “In view of the widespread network that has operated, as the status reports disclose and the admission of the persons arrested, including some beneficiary candidates, we are of the opinion, in view of the strong possibilities of identification of other candidates as well involved in such malpractices, that the examination has become a suspect.
“It is thus necessary, for all the role players in the process, to secure and sustain the confidence of the public in general and the student fraternity in particular in the system by its unquestionable trustworthiness. Such a system is endorsed because of its credibility informed with guarantee of fairness, transparency authenticity and sanctity. There cannot be any compromise with these imperatives at any cost,” the Bench said.
It also directed the investigating agency (Haryana Police) to complete its probe in the case with all “alacrity and earnestness” in accordance with law.
The Vacation Bench, in its 41-page-judgement, said that the investigation reveals that 44 candidates have been found to be confirmed beneficiaries of this “unprincipled manoeuvre” but their “segregation” by withholding their results for the time being cannot be the solution to the problem.
The court further held that the examination stands “denuded of its sanctity” and keeping in view that the course would yield future generations of doctors of the country, who would be in charge of public health, “their inherent merit to qualify for taking the course can by no means be compromised”.
“We are conscious of the fact that every examination being conducted by a human agency is likely to suffer from some shortcomings, but deliberate inroad into its framework of the magnitude and the nature, as exhibited, demonstrate a deep seated and pervasive impact, which ought not to be disregarded or glossed over, lest it may amount to travesty of a proclaimed mechanism to impartially judge the comparative merit of the candidates partaking therein.
“If such an examination is saved, merit would be a casualty generating a sense of frustration in the genuine students, with aversion to the concept of examination. The possibility of leaning towards unfair means may also be the ultimate fallout. Even if, one undeserving candidate, a beneficiary of such illegal machination, though undetected is retained in the process it would be in denial of, the claim of more deserving candidates,” it said.