The Supreme Court directed the Central Board of Secondary Education on Friday to hold afresh the All India Pre-Medical Test and declare the results on or before August 17.
The court had on June 15 cancelled the AIPMT held on May 3 and ordered the CBSE to conduct a fresh test within four weeks.
However, the Board had returned to the court, saying it was impossible to conduct a re-test by then as at least three months were required.
A vacation Bench, headed by Justice R.K. Agrawal, gave the Board one month extra and went ahead with fixing the schedules for the counselling rounds.
“The first counselling shall be held on or before August 28, the second counselling on or before September 4 and the third counselling on or before September 11,” the Bench said.
The Board, represented by Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi and Solicitor-General Ranjit Kumar, argued strongly in favour of a three-month extension of the time schedule.
‘Teachers not available’Mr. Rohatgi said teachers were not available because of the vacation, and 1,050 exam centres had to be arranged.
Additional Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta, representing the Medical Council of India, said the schedule should be squeezed as the start of the academic session would be delayed, particularly for students allotted 15 per cent of the seats of the MBBS and BDS courses in the country.
Students in distressThe cancellation of the May 3 test has affected over six lakh students. The court had said that any attempt to save the test, in which massive fraud took place, will “leave merit a casualty and generate frustration among genuine students”.
