Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Monday issued notices to the State government and the Mumbai University, seeking their response on the delay in law exam results this year.
A bench of Justices Anoop V. Mohta and Bharati Dangre said that considering the chaos surrounding the delay in the assessment of the final semester LLB answer sheets this year, the “State and the university must join hands to tackle the crisis”.
The bench was hearing a bunch of petitions filed by affected students, who have sought directions to the authorities to announce the results without further delay. One of the pleas, filed by three final-year law students, has also sought that the university be directed to award monetary compensation to the students, who have had to endure much agony and have missed out on several opportunities for higher studies in the absence of their undergraduate results.
As per the university’s own records, around one lakh law students appeared for the final-year exams in April and May and are awaiting results, they contended.
According to the petitioners, statutory rules mandate that the university must declare the results of any exam within 45 days of its completion, and that all new academic sessions commence latest by August 1 every year. The petitioners contended that the primary reason for the delay was the “university’s decision to use the new on-screen assessment system without ensuring adequate infrastructure for its implementation”.
One of tje petitioners said there were even reports that the university had “mixed up the supplementary and main answer sheets of some students, and that in several cases, the main answer sheets had gone missing.”
The petitioners told the court the university had earlier said the assessment of the law papers would be completed by August 24, but it “seemed unlikely”.
