SC Judgment on Rounding off of Marks

Recently, the Supreme Court passed a very important judgment. This case was an appeal, by special leave, directed against the judgment of the Division Bench of the Karnataka High Court which declined to entertain the appeal filed by the appellant challenging the judgment of a single judge of the High Court permitting rounding-off of the percentage of marks obtained by respondent so as to make her eligible to get admission to post-graduate course.

The eligibility criteria prescribed by the Indian Nursing Council for securing admission to the said PG course was 55% aggregate marks. The candidate, however, secured 54.71% aggregate marks from N.T.R. University of Health Sciences in the Bachelor of Science degree in the year 1997.

Thus, the only question of law involved in this case was whether by applying the principle of rounding-off the eligibility criteria prescribed for the qualifying examination for admission to the PG course in M.Sc (Nursing) can be relaxed?

Before proceeding further, we must know some facts relating to this case:

“When she was preparing to take the annual examination, she was informed by the second respondent that she was not eligible to take examination as she has secured less than 55% in the qualifying examination. She approached the petitioner for reconsideration of her case. She was informed that on reconsideration it was found that she was not eligible to take examination. She, therefore, preferred writ petition in the High Court challenging the said communication. She obtained an interim order permitting her to take first year examination. She took the examination but, results were withheld. She was also permitted to take the second year examination by an interim order. Thus, she has completed the PG course by taking both the examinations. As stated by us earlier, while issuing notice, this court directed that her results be declared and her admission be regularized.”

The Court cited Orissa Public Service Commission and Another v. Rupashree Chowdhary and Another in this regard. In this case, it was said that:

“After considering the Orissa Rules, this court held that Rule 24 thereof made it clear that in order to qualify in the written examination a candidate has to obtain a minimum of 33% marks in each of the papers and not less than 45% marks in the aggregate in all the written papers in the main examination. This court observed that when emphasis is given in the rule itself to the minimum marks to be obtained, there can be no relaxation or rounding-off. It was observed that no power was provided in the statute/rules permitting any such rounding-off or giving grace marks. It was clarified that the Orissa Rules are statutory in nature and no dilution or amendment to such rules is permissible or possible by adding some words to the said statutory rules for giving the benefit of rounding-off or relaxation.”

The court applied this case to the present case and held that:

“No provision of any statute or any rules framed thereunder has been shown to us, which permits rounding-off of eligibility criteria prescribed for the qualifying examination for admission to the PG course in M.SC (Nursing). When an eligibility criterion is prescribed in a qualifying examination, it must be strictly adhered to. Any dilution or tampering with it will work injustice on other candidates. The Division Bench of the High Court erred in holding that learned Single Judge was right in rounding-off of 54.71% to 55% so as to make respondent 1 eligible for admission to PG course. Such rounding-off is impermissible.”

Thus, no rounding-off is permissible in any such cases. If we look from a strict Positivist view, this judgment sounds absolutely correct. The court’s logic is that if an eligibility criterion is prescribed, it must be strictly adhered to and any dilution of it will work injustice on other candidates. But, this judgment fails to cite any reasons regarding the manner in which such dilution has caused injustice to other candidates in the present case.

If the exam in contention was some competitive examination like UPSC, Judicial Services, IITJEE, AIPMT or AIEEE i.e. where a separate qualifying examination is conducted and that examination serves as the eligibility criterion not the marks obtained in the degree, then this logic of the court would have worked perfectly fine. This is because, in those competitive examinations, thousands and lakhs of candidates appear and even a slightest change in the cut-off would cause serious prejudice to a lot of candidates.

However, in case of PG Courses, not many students apply. Also, the PG Courses are usually oriented towards research and skill-enhancing. In the present case, the candidate wanted to apply for a PG Course in the field of Nursing. The judgment nowhere mentions that her selection caused any prejudice or injustice to any other candidate who applied for this course. In fact, as mentioned earlier, the candidate had already completed her M.Sc. Degree and the question of rounding off remained only an academic question left for the court to answer. The court also said that this judgment will not have any adverse impact on the future prospects of the respondent.

Then, what is the reasoning on the basis of which the court decides that rounding off in such cases is impermissible? Just because, a candidate misses the eligibility criterion by 0.29% (55% - 54.71%), she becomes ineligible for further studies in her area of expertise. This becomes all the more relevant considering the fact that the facts of this case or the judgment nowhere show that any prejudice was caused to any other person by rounding off of the respondent’s marks. The court merely reiterated the principle laid down in a previous judgment and applied it mindlessly in the present case without citing any reasons.

I do not think that a lot of people will subscribe to my view but in a country, where there is already so much prejudice and injustice, the courts should be careful in giving such baseless decisions. I am not saying that the eligibility criterion of exams should be diluted in all the cases. These cases must be decided on case to case basis and before giving any such decision, the court must fully appreciate the merits of that case. I feel that the court did not appreciate the facts of this case in a wholesome manner. The court has given a straight-jacket formula and an inflexible rule which could lead to grave injustice in future cases. Such questions must be left open and be decided on a case to case basis. I do not feel that there is any need to set precedence in this regard.

I agree that leaving this question open might lead to multiplicity of litigation. But, it is preferable to have multiplicity of litigation instead of causing injustice to even a single candidate. I feel that the ratio in this case will definitely cause prejudice and injustice to a lot of future candidates applying for PG Courses and higher studies. What is the harm in giving some relaxation in eligibility criterion to a candidate, if that relaxation is not causing any prejudice or injustice to the other candidates or the stakeholders and the candidate is able to fill an unfilled seat.