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2. The salient facts as appeared in the writ petition in brief are as follows : the petitioner No. 2 applied with registration fee to appear in the Joint. Entrance Examination to be held in 1982 and his registration number in the said examination is M/GAS-114. The admit card issued to the petitioner in respect of the said examination was annexed as annexure 'C' to the petition. The petitioner No. 2 duly appeared in the said examination and answered all questions to his greatest satisfaction. He expected to do better in the said examination and he also expected to be within the successful candidates in order of merit for being admitted in the medical colleges. It has been pleaded that the result was first published on 30th June. 1982 but immediately after publication the list was hurriedly withdrawn for republication later on. The list was subsequently published in July, 1982 and in that list petitioner's name did not appear. It has been stated that the Board does not follow any system to afford an opportunity to the aggrieved student for review, re-examination and/or scrutiny of his or her answer scripts. It has also been pleaded that there was a great difference in the result published in the first blush and in the results that was published in the second time, thereby giving room for serious doubts of arbitrariness, discrepancy, malpractice and utter discrimination at the behest of some persons of influence having vested interest. There has been serious resentment amongst students who appeared in the ensuing examination, examiners connected with the examination, guardians, educationists and people in general as to the mala fide and arbitrary mode of conducting and publication of the result of Joint Entrance Examination, 1982 held by the West Bengal Board of Examination for admission to Engineering, Medical and Technological Decree Colleges. It has been pleaded that the answer scripts of the students were not properly and fairly examined and there is discrimination in the matter of tabulation of marks and in publication of the list of successful candidates. It has also been stated that grace marks have been given to the tune of sixty in number without having any declared policy, rules, norms, procedure and lawful practice. It will be evident if all the relevant documents including answer scripts, tabulation sheets, selection papers and connected marksheet are produced before this Hon'ble Court, that there has been gross injustice, unfairness, arbitrary discrimination, undue favouritism, sacrificing all norms and procedures of fair examination system to the greatest prejudice and injury to the case of the students in general and to the case of the petitioner No. 2, in particular. In spite of repeated asking the authority refused to review the answer scripts on the plea that there was no such rule for review or disclose of the marks obtained by the examinees. As such the instant application has been made in a representative capacity on behalf of the unsuccessful candidates as well as on behalf of the petitioner himself. This application was moved on 30th July, 1982 whereon this court directed the petitioner to serve copies of this application on the respondents and on interim order was made in the meantime restraining the respondents from giving effect to the impugned results of Joint Entrance Examination held in 1982 and they were further directed to produce the results that was published first on 30th of June, 1982 as well as the subsequent results before this court on that day. The respondents were further directed to preserve all the papers of the examinees.

13. An affidavit in rejoinder was filed on 11th January, 1983 and the same has been sworn by Dr. Jitendra Lal Banerjee, petitioner No. 1. It has been stated in paragraph 7 of the said affidavit that there has not been any proper formation of the Board. No rules have been framed to hold impartial examination on the competitive basis. There is no reason to award grace marks without the consent of the Examiner. Head Examiner, Tabulators and Moderators. There is no disclosure under what circumstances a confidential secret committee was formed and under what provisions and under whose authority, it assumed jurisdiction to award Brace mark in a competitive examination. It has been further stated that there was submission from the Bar that the erace marks have been awarded to all candidates uniformly, the affidavit-in-opposition is absolutely silent on this score and it has not been explained why the grace marks have been given to all the candidates while the Joint Entrance Examination does not stand for qualifying examination with the significance of 'pass and fail'. It is essentially a competitive examination, award of grace mark itself raises grave suspicion and the alleged rule to refuse review and re-examination are mala fide and motivated. It is further stated in paragraph 8 that the materials on record clearly indicate that the Board itself published the result and there are serious anomalies, contradictions, inconsistencies and arbitrary discrimination. It has also been stated in paragraph 10 that the formation of the Confidential Sub-Committee is unauthorised and unknown in law. It has also been disputed that the Board approved the purported decision of the confidential sub-committee. In paragraph 11 of the said affidavit it has been submitted that the alleged offer of re-examination by fresh new separate sets of examiners was never refused bv the petitioner. All that the petitioners submitted before the learned Appeal Court that without prejudice to their rights and contentions to the main rule itself, such examination of the answer scripts could be made, The Board did not agree.

33. It has been pleaded in the writ application that the West Bengal Board of Examination while taking the selection test have not acted fairly and properly inasmuch as there was wide publicity that the Board has given grace marks to the tune of 50 marks in certain selected cases without having any declared policy, rules, norms, procedure and lawful practice. It has been further pleaded in paragraph 16 of the writ application that in giving these grace marks to some selected candidates neither the consent of the examiners had been sought for nor any approval of the authorities concerned including the Medical Council of India was obtained and no consistent principle and systematic formula has been followed fa this respect. It has been further pleaded in paragraph 17 that if the answer scripts as well as tabulation sheets, selection papers and connected mark sheets are produced if will be evident that there has been gross injustice, unfairness, arbitrary discrimination, undue favouritism, sacrificing all norms and procedures of fair examination system to the greatest prejudice and injury to the case of the students in general and to the case of the petitioner No. 2 in particular.

37. Another rejoinder was sworn bv the petitioner No. 1 on 11th January, 1983 and it has been stated in paragraph 7 that it being essentially a competitive examination award of grace mark itself raises grave suspicion and the alleged rule to refuse review and re-examination are mala fide and motivated. It has also been stated in paragraph 8 that in the result that has been published bv the Board there are serious anomalies, contradiction and arbitrary discrimination. It has also been stated that the statement that the petitioner refused offer of the Board in the trial court as well as in the appeal court for fresh examination of the answer scripts is wholly wrong as wrongly made in the said affidavit-in-opposition. On the other hand. the petitioner agreed for fresh examination of the answer scripts by separate sets of examiners in the appeal court.