Open Letter To Legal Fraternity From An Aggrieved Parent Seeking CLAT 2017 Re-Exam

I have a few questions to ask. Are you proud of your LLB qualification? Do you recommend students to choose law as a career? Do you feel top NLUs in India are the places to go when it comes to legal education?

I asked you this question; but I know the answer is "YES". One answer I want to give before I go ahead. Who am I? I am the parent of a student who appeared for CLAT 2017. There is no lawyer in our family. When my son was deciding his career, we talked to people of various professions. He was fascinated by Law. The lawyers we met were passionate about their career. They said: "if you want to do law, target CLAT. Go to a good NLU."

There started yet another CLAT DREAM.

I am sure you all would agree that it is no less than an IIT dream. It needs equal (if not more) hard work, dedication and perseverance. Two years of dedication, constant balancing between 12th and CLAT studies; dreamy eyes and soul worked tirelessly towards the goal. Do I sound dramatic? Ask family member of any serious CLAT taker. Passion is the word. Many of you have surely experienced it yourself.

I appeal to each one associated with the legal fraternity - lawyerS, advocates, politicians. These students look up to you when they choose Law. I appeal to legal firms like Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A Shroff & Co, AZB and Co, Khaitan, J Sagar Associates, Luthra and Luthra law office, Trilegal, S&R Associates and many more.

You are dream organisations of any aspiring lawyer. Please read this little long article with patience.

The CLAT exam was held on May 14, 2017. They released answer key on May 16. There were at least 20+ errors. They fall into following categories:

1) No option was correct

2) Two answers were correct

3) Incorrect option was marked as correct

4) Question had error. So, students could not solve it.

20 errors make 10% of question paper. Recently, in a high court judgment about CBSE Class 12 moderation, the court had said: "Rules of the game should be set before the game begins".

Students did not know the following rules in CLAT exam:

1) There can be errors, so many errors in the question paper

2) There can be two answers to one question

3) There can be questions where no option is correct or questions can be erroneous

In those 2 hours, when time management is the key aspect, students made different choices because of the changed rules. Some played it safe and did not mark any answer if they found two answers correct, while others marked one of them. They tried solving erroneous questions - each one gave different answer based on their decision.

Between May 16 and May 19, they spent time finding errors and raising objections, between their other law entrance examinations.

On May 25, CLAT gave the revised answer key:

1) 4 questions cancelled - Students spent different duration starting from zero to n minutes in attempting these questions. How can it be accounted for? What justice is done to a student who spent time enough to identify error in question and mark answer? They could have got +4 marks if they had spent time in attempting other questions (some who left these questions without attempting got time advantage here).

2) For two questions, CLAT is now accepting two correct answers. What about students who left these questions to avoid the risk of negative marking? The students who took risk (tukka in Hindi) benefitted and are getting +2 marks here.

3) One relationship question (4611392876) could have two answers - mother and aunt. Answer to this question was marked as ‘aunt’ in May 16 answer key. So, students who marked the answer as ‘aunt’ got 1 mark.

In May 26 answer key, the correct answer is marked as ‘mother’ and answer ‘aunt’ is given wrong.

So, there are 3 cases:

1. a) Person who marked ‘aunt’ goes down by -1.25 marks.


2. b) Person who marked ‘mother’ gets +1.25.


3. c) Person who did not attempt gets a 0.

So, in revised answer key, student who marked ‘aunt’ goes down by 2.25 marks as compared to person who marked another correct answer ‘mother’.

4) At least 7 errors, very obvious ones, are not accepted. For e.g., 4611392701, which is a simple subject verb agreement query, where student giving the correct answer loses 0.25 marks and goes deficit by 1.25 marks as compared to student giving the wrong answer.

Can a student gain these 15 - 20 marks lost in other questions? No, he/she is already out of the game.

My objections

1) CLAT 2017 examination was not fair. Damage was done as students took examination laced with errors. Correction to this problem cannot be done by marking few answers correct.

2) Even a school level examination of an ordinary school or state level clerical examination does not have so many errors. Can we really say, it is okay when CLAT tries to patch up by cancelling few questions or changing answers to few questions?

3) CLAT is a prestigious examination. There has to be multiple levels of filtration before the question paper reaches student. The minimum that a CLAT taker deserves is an error-free question paper.

4) Set the rules of CLAT and stick to it. Can CLAT have multiple-choice questions correct? Can CLAT have questions with no option correct?

CLAT 2017 re-exam needed

I am not a lawyer. I do not know what I should do here. If you agree with the following points, can each one of you write about it in appropriate forums, write to the appropriate authorities, file a PIL (I do not even know if each one of you can do it for the same issue. Please excuse my ignorance here) for CLAT re-examination.

1) CLAT should be as prestigious as JEE Advanced

2) An aspirant should feel secured to take up Law as his/her career choice and invest two years preparing for CLAT.

3) Law aspirant should take the first step towards NLUs – CLAT - without any fear of uncertainty and injustice.

Please help me and many others in getting justice. Please help and take steps so that there is RE- EXAMINATION of CLAT in 2017.

Isn't it an irony that 18-year-old CLAT takers, today's youth, who want be torch bearers of justice in India, face injustice in their first step towards it? If you do not do anything to correct this, it will be the failure of the entire legal fraternity.

A hopeful parent