NEET: CBSE may move SC against HC’s ‘grace marks’

Manash.Gohain@timesgroup.com

New Delhi: 12.07.2018

The Central Board of Secondary Education is set to move the Supreme Court contesting the order of the Madras HC to grant 196 marks to every candidate who took the NEET-UG in Tamil this year for errors in translation of questions from English. The HC had said all such candidates should be granted four grace marks each for errors in 49 questions.

The board is awaiting a direction from the ministry of human resource development before going ahead with the appeal. According to a ministry source, the board is taking legal opinion and is likely to move the apex court on Friday after it gets the ministry’s nod.

The HRD ministry is also taking the opinion of the health ministry which is involved in counselling and seat allotment, the source said.

‘Awaiting HRD ministry views on the issue’

In CBSE’s information bulletin for NEET-2018, the source said, it was stated that candidates opting for regional languages would be provided bilingual test booklet — in selected regional language and English — and “in case of any ambiguity in translation of any of the questions, its English version shall be treated as final”.

“Right now we are in consultation with the legal team and planning to appeal against the order in the Supreme Court. However, we are also in touch with the HRD ministry and waiting for its views on the same,” said the source.

Candidates opting for Hindi or regional languages were given bilingual NEET test booklet with the English version of questions and those opting for English were provided with test booklet in English only.

Petitioner and senior CPM leader T K Rangarajan had sought full marks for the 49 questions, saying key words in the Tamil questions were wrongly translated from English and this caused confusion among the candidates.

The HC bench said the students who took the NEET for admission to medical, and dental colleges in Tamil should be suitably compensated to provide a level-playing ground.


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