With several aggrieved management aspirants who appeared for the online Maharashtra Common Entrance Test (MAH- CET) for business schools in March having filed a public interest litigation (PIL) in the Bombay high Court seeking a re-test, the Directorate of Technical Education (DTE), which conducts the exam, said it is not possible to conduct exams again as the admission process has already started.
The DTE also told the Bombay high court on Thursday it will not take any further steps in the admission process for MBA courses for now, but maintained a re-test will not be held.
A DTE official, on condition of anonymity, said the admission process in private B-schools has already started. “In order to give complete relief to the students, we have already formed an expert committee which deleted incorrect questions and came up with a normalisation process. However, as the matter is sub-judice, we will clarify our views to the court during the next hearing on April 15.”
In court, senior advocate Ashutosh Kumbhakoni, representing DTE, told the division bench of justice VM Kanade and justice AR Joshi that the directorate will not take steps to complete the admission process. Kumbhakoni said that while a re-test will not be held, DTE has decided not to evaluate the controversial questions.
Senior advocate Vineet Naik, who represented the three petitioners, said the question papers for each of the four batches had between 11 and 19 wrong questions. Naik said the aspirants spent time attempting the wrong questions, which was an unnecessary stress. “Try to imagine the condition of a student attempting the paper, if the first 19 questions are wrong in a question paper with 200 objective and tricky questions,” Naik said.
{{/usCountry}}Senior advocate Vineet Naik, who represented the three petitioners, said the question papers for each of the four batches had between 11 and 19 wrong questions. Naik said the aspirants spent time attempting the wrong questions, which was an unnecessary stress. “Try to imagine the condition of a student attempting the paper, if the first 19 questions are wrong in a question paper with 200 objective and tricky questions,” Naik said.
{{/usCountry}}The MAH-CET test was conducted on March 14 and 15 in four slots. After complaints were made by aspirants about errors and technical glitches, the DTE formed an expert committee to redress the issue.
However, the results – declared on March 25 – based on a process called normalisation (see box), was not accepted by some candidates.
Aspirants who approached the court are hopeful about a re-test. “Approaching the court was last the option,” said Bhagat Makhijani, a Bandra-based petitioner. “The court did not accept our demand for suo motu action. Hence we filed a PIL. Earlier, we approached DTE officials several times and even wrote to the state higher education minister Vinod Tawde and the chief minister, before the results were announced. We hope the court will come up with a better decision when the matter is heard on April 15,” Makhijani said.
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