Madras High Court
R. Rajasekaran vs University Of Madras And Others on 5 September, 1991
Equivalent citations: AIR1993MAD34, AIR 1993 MADRAS 34
ORDER Nainar Sundaram, J.
1. The petitioner in W. P. No. 2474 of 1985 is the appellant in this writ appeal. The respondents in the writ petition are the respondents in this writ appeal. Convenience suggests that we should refer to the parties as per their nomenclature in the writ petition. The petitioner came to this Court by way of the writ petition projecting the following prayer :
"For the reasons stated in the accompanying affidavit, it is prayed that this Honourable Court may be pleased to issue a writ of declaration or any other appropriate order or direction in the nature of writ declaring the resolution of the Syndicate of Madras University dated 28-6-84 scrapping the scheme of revaluation with effect from 1-7-84 as null and void and pass such other further orders as may deem fit and proper in the circumstances of the case and thus render justice."
The petitioner at the relevant point of time was a student in law. Having successfully completed the first year of the course, he came to the second year but there he failed in certain subjects. Obviously, he was not satisfied with regard to the valuation of the papers and he wanted revaluation, but the process of revaluation could not be availed of, because the Regulations prevailing did not permit revaluation. By resolution dated 1-7-84, provision has been made only for retotalling of the marks and not for revaluation of the answer papers. The petitioner wanted to delete this resolution and that was why he projected the prayer extracted above in the writ petition. The learned single Judge, who dealt with the writ petition, found no warrant for granting any relief to the petitioner and dismissed the writ petition. This writ appeal is directed against the order of the learned single Judge.
2. Mr. R. Karuppan, learned counsel for the petitioner, endeavoured his best to impress upon us that the system of revaluation of the answer papers in examinations held by the respondents is a salutory one and that alone conformed to the principles of fair play We would have dwelt upon this subject a little more, but for the fact that the pronouncement of the highest Court in the land has spoken of the same and that is against the petitioner. In Maharashtra S.B.O.S. and H. S. Education v. Paritosh , there was an attack of a regulation which provided that no revaluation of the answer books or supplement shall be done and that no candidate shall claim or be entitled to claim a revaluation of his answer books. The High Court held the said regulation to be void on the ground of unreasonableness and denial of fair play. In disagreeing with the view of the High Court, the highest Court in the land observed as follows :--
'We are unable to agree with the further reason stated by the High Court that since 'every student has a right to receive fair play in examination and get appropriate marks matching his performance', it will be a denial of the right to such fair play if there is to be a prohibition on the right to demand revaluation and unless a right to revaluation is recognised and permitted there is an infringement of rules of fair play."
The further passages occurring in the Supreme Court decision are worth noting and they run as follows :--
"Further, it is in the public interest that the results of Public examinations when published should have some finality attached to them. If inspection, verification in the presence of the candidates and revaluation are to be allowed as of right, it may lead to gross and indefinite uncertainty, particularly in regard to the relative ranking etc., of the candidates, besides leading to utter confusion on account of the enormity of the labour and time involved in the process.
.....If the principle laid down by the High Court is to be regarded as correct, its applicability cannot be restricted to examinations conducted by School Educational Boards alone but would extend even to all competitive examinations conducted by the Union and State Public Service Commissions. The resultant legal position emerging from the High Court judgment is that every candidate who has appeared for any such examination and who is dissatisfied with his results would, as an inherent part of his right to 'fair play' be entitled to demand a disclosure and personal inspection of his answer scripts and would have a further right to ask for revaluation of his answer papers. The inevitable consequence would be that there will be no certainty at all regarding the results of the competitive examination for an indefinite period of time until all such requests have been complied with and the results of the verification and revaluation have been brought into account."
The pronouncement of the highest Court in the land has been a matter of being followed in a number of pronouncements of this Court and it would suffice the purpose if we refer to the pronouncement of a Bench of this Court to which one of us (Nainar Sundaram, J.,) had been a party in B. Rajappa v. The Additional Controller of Examinations and The Registrar, University of Madras (1989 Writ LR 55). We are bound to follow the principle enunciated by the highest Court in the land and so followed, we have to discountenance the claim of the petitioner put forth in the prayer in the writ petition. In this view, this writ appeal fails and the same is dismissed. No costs.
3. Appeal dismissed.