CONVENOR EAMCET 1998 JNTU Vs. D SATISH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal by the Convenor, EAMCET 1998 is directed against the order of the learned Single Judge disposing of the Writ Petition filed by a student who appeared for EAMCET-98 (Medical) with the following directions: For all the abovementioned reasons, I direct the third respondent to evaluate the abovementioned 13 questions which are said to have been answered wrongly by the petitioner, with reference to the B series, be crosschecked with reference to the D series and depending on the outcome of such a process, the rank of the petitioner be revised. It is further directed, basing on such revision, the case of the petitioner be considered for admission into M.B.B.S. course in accordance with rules. The whole exercise of the revision of the rank of the petitioner as indicated above, should be completed within a period of one week from the date of receipt of a copy of this order.

(2.) The parties will be referred to by their status in the writ petition. The petitioner, a student aspiring for admission into M.B.B.S. Course had appeared for the EAMCET-98 examination on 14-5-1998. It is an objective type examination, which consists of 200 questions. The duration of examination is three hours. The answers to the questions are required to be indicated in a separate sheet called OMR sheet. The question paper consists of four subjects viz., Botany, Zoology, Physics and Chemistry and under each subject 50 questions will be given and the question paper booklet also consists of four divisions. To eliminate any possibility of malpractice of copying etc., a system was devised by which the question papers are made in four different series viz., 'A', 'B', 'C' and 'D'. The sequence of questions is each of the series is different from the other series and the booklets will be distributed in the examination hall in such a way that no two neighbouring students would get the same series of the question paper. It may be noted herein that on publication of final key by the Convenor for the year in question 23 questions were deleted and only 177 questions were considered for evaluation of the merit of the candidates and ranks were assigned basing on the marks obtained by the candidates out of 177 questions,

(3.) The case of the petitioner is that when the examination commenced, question paper of 'B' series No. 861838 was supplied to him, which is in the subject order of Botany, Zoology, Physics and Chemistry. But to his surprise in the group of first 50 questions, questions 31 to 38 were not at all printed and questions 41 to 50 were repetitions of earlier questions. When the same was brought to the notice of the invigilator, he was asked to continue with the same paper pending decision by the Chief Superintendent. According to the petitioner, even in respect of Chemistry subject also similar discrepancy crept in and when the same was brought to the notice of the invigilator, nearly after one hour from the commencement of examination, he was supplied with another booklet of 'B' series No. 862022. The plea for grant of extra time for compensation of loss of time he suffered due to the confusion was declined. However, it may be noticed that he has been able to answer all the 200 questions. The petitioner secured 2274th rank.