Delhi High Court: A petition was filed for seeking directions to Central Board of Secondary Education (‘CBSE’) to allow 16 students of Class 10th and 12th of the petitioner-school to appear in their compartment/improvement examination, scheduled for 15-07-2024 and further CBSE be directed to re-open their online portal for submission of relevant details of 45 students, since the petitioner-teacher failed to upload the details of these students on the CBSE’s portal within the stipulated time due to her medical emergency. Swarna Kanta Sharma*, J., held that the school has been very negligent in the present case, however, to ensure fairness and consistent treatment, the Court directed that the 16 students from the petitioner-school be accommodated in the same manner as the students from the Rajasthan High Court’s order. The CBSE was directed to take similar actions for these students, provided the Rajasthan High Court’s order was not overturned or stayed by the Division Bench. The Court also imposed a cost of Rs. 50,000 on the school for its negligence and directed the amount to be deposited with the Delhi High Court Legal Services Committee within one week.
Background:
In an instant case, CBSE declared the results for Class 10th and Class 12th for the academic session 2023-24, on 13-05-2024, within the petitioner-school, 07 students from Class 10th and 09 students from Class 12th were had compartments in various subjects. Subsequently, CBSE had invited applications from these students to sit for their respective compartment examinations. Additionally, applications were also invited from students who wished to reappear in the examinations for the purpose of improvement. These applications were to be submitted online via the CBSE’s portal, which was made accessible on 31-05-2024, pursuant to a circular issued on 30-05-2024. The stipulated deadline for uploading the application forms was 15-06-2024, with a provision for late submission until 17-06-2024, upon payment of a late fee.
The exam coordinator of the school, responsible for this task, was admitted to the hospital from 21-05-2024 for a week and again from 02-06-2024 for five days, and rejoined duties on 19-06-2024. Upon her return, she found that the application forms for the compartment exams had not been uploaded and she immediately emailed CBSE on 20-06-2024, requesting the re-opening of the portal and disclosing the genuine reason for the delay. In response, CBSE asked the school to send the list of candidates with their marksheets, which was done on the same day. Despite multiple requests, the CBSE did not reopen the portal, and on 10-07-2024, informed the school that permission could not be granted at this stage.
Analysis:
The Court after perusal of facts and contentions was of the view that, the respondent had issued the circular in timely manner and specified all the necessary information, it was the petitioner-school who had failed to submit the details of its students, on the online portal of CBSE, within the aforementioned time schedule.
The Court was further of the view that, as the admit cards had already been issued and centres had been already allotted to 3.5 Lakhs students who were appearing for the examination. Therefore, at this stage, though considering that it was a very unfortunate situation for the students who were to appear for Class 10th and 12th Supplementary Examination, this Court was not inclined to direct the respondent to re-open the portal and allot admit cards to the petitioner to appear for their Class 10th or 12th supplementary examination.
The order passed by the Rajasthan High Court was presented by the petitioner which was on the similar facts and CBSE was one of the parties there too. The Court then noted that the respondent was present when the order in question had been passed and similarly placed students therein had been permitted to appear in the supplementary examination to be conducted on 15-07-2024. The Rajasthan High Court in that case, further issued directions that the admit cards would be issued by the CBSE to the students by 13-07-2024.
Therefore, this Court, directed that the 16 students of the petitioner-school, qua whom the present petition had been filed by the petitioner-school, would also be accommodated in similar fashion and to same extent, as per the convenience of CBSE and in the manner deemed appropriate at its end, as in compliance of the orders of the Rajasthan High Court. Thus, the Court allowed similarly placed students to appear in the examinations.
The Court further noted that, the students, who were already under pressure of their compartment/supplementary board examination of class 10th and 12th and anxiety of their future overpowers them frequently, should not be made to suffer for no fault of theirs by losing an academic year and opting for higher studies, for which many must already be taking coaching classes or studying for.
The Court then was of the that the present case had to be filed due to sheer negligence of the petitioner-school itself which had put the future of their own students at stake, with uncertainty looming large on their future. Therefore, the Court imposed a cost of Rs.50,000/- on the petitioner-school and directed that the same be deposited with Delhi High Court Legal Services Committee within one week.
[C.P. Arya Public Jr. High School v. CBSE, 2024 SCC OnLine Del 4775, decided on: 12-07-2024]
Advocates who appeared in this case :
For Petitioner: Rakesh Kumar Khanna, Senior Advocate; Pramod Kumar and Anurag Kasana, Advocates.
For Respondent: Sanjay Khanna, SC for CBSE; Pragya Bhushan, Karandeep Singh and Tarandeep Singh, Advocates.
