Delhi HC Directs JNU To Grant M. A. Degree To Visually Impaired Candidate And Admit Him To Its M. Phil. Programme [Read Judgment]

The Delhi HC on Monday directed Jawaharlal Nehru University to admit a visually impaired candidate to its M. Phil. programme despite the contentions of the university that the candidate had not completed requisite credit score in his M. A. programme and thus did not meet the eligibility criteria for admission and.

Background

The peculiar facts of the case were that the Petitioner, a visually impaired student in the M.A. programme at JNU, had applied for repeating the four courses of his 2nd semester with the 4th semester in order to improve his performance therein. The said application was filled by the Section Officer of the Centre for Persian & Central Asian Studies (CPCAS) and was approved by both the Chairman of the CPCAS and the Controller of Examination.

The Petitioner however, later discovered that he could only have repeated two courses of his 2nd semester, in light of Clause 7.3(b) of Ordinance 15(A) of the Ordinances relating to the award of M.A./M.Sc. degrees. The same was brought to the notice of the Section Officer of CPCAS who informed the Petitioner that the registration form would be rejected automatically by the computer system. Assured by the Section Officer, the Petitioner did not appear for the examination for the said four courses of 2nd semester.

However, to the Petitioner's utter surprise, his previous score in the four subjects of 2nd semester was dropped and he had been awarded an "F" for all the four repeat courses of his 2nd semester, as he had failed to appear therein. Thus he was awarded only 52 credits instead of 68 and he could not get the M.A. degree for which minimum of 64 credits were required as per Clause 7.2 of the said Ordinance. The Petitioner made various representations in this behalf before the university authorities, but the same were rejected. This in consequence rendered him ineligible to apply for M. Phil. programme at the university.

Petitioner's stand

The Petitioner argued that the application for repeating the course was in violation of Clause 7.3(b) of the said Ordinance and was thereby void ab initio and could not have been processed by the Respondent. Thus, he appeared in all the courses of his M.A. programme and was entitled to be awarded all 68 credits. He further argued that his marks, as originally scored in the 2nd semester, could not have been dropped by the Respondent.

He further argued that even if the credit score of 2nd semester was not to counted, he had obtained a CGPA 5.35 which was enough to get admission in the M. Phil programme of the university in both general and physically disabled quota. Thus, he demanded to be granted exception in Clause 12 of the said Ordinance in terms of lack of credit score, seeking to be admitted in the M. Phil. programme on the basis of his CGPA. (Clause 12 permits relaxation of various conditions in the Ordinance, in exceptional cases)

Rival's contentions

The Respondent contended that the Petitioner was treated as never having appeared for the four courses of the 2nd semester of his M.A. programme, on the reasoning that:

(i) by applying for permission to repeat the said four courses, the petitioner had surrendered the credits, as well as the grades, originally earned by him for the 2nd semester, and

(ii) since the Petitioner had failed to appear for the four courses of the 2nd semester, he was not entitled to any credits or any grade, against the said four courses of his 2nd semester.

Thus it was submitted that the Petitioner was ineligible for being awarded M.A. degree as per Clause 7.2 of the said Ordinance, which requires a minimum of 64 credits for the award of the said degree.

Findings

Justice C. Hari Shankar assessed the arguments advanced by both the parties and opined in favour of the Petitioner. He held that the application for repeating all four courses was void ab initio and that in registering the Petitioner, for re-attempting all the four courses of his 2nd semester, the authorities in the CPCAS had acted in an illegal manner.

"The respondents having, therefore, pursued the said course – perhaps by inadvertence or oversight – in violation of the interdiction contained in Clause 7.3(b) of Ordinance 15(A), the petitioner could not be made to suffer for not having followed it up and appeared in all the four courses, which would, in turn, have resulted in his infracting Clause 7.3(b) of Ordinance 15(A)", he said.

The court further directed that the original grades, and the GPAs, as obtained by the Petitioner in the 2nd semester be restored and he be granted the M. A. degree so as to facilitate his admission to the M. Phil. programme.

"The word "handicapped" has, with the passage of time, revealed itself to have been a malapropism all along, and persons who suffer from unfortunate physical limitations are now, more appropriately, recognised as being merely "challenged". We see, every day, persons overcoming such challenges, thrown in their way by an unhappy providence, and excelling. The stage of integration of such persons into the mainstream of society, is long past; it only remains, now, for us to recognise that such persons are a part of our society, and one that is essential, and inalienable", Justice C. Shankar added.

Arguments for the Petitioner were advanced by Senior Advocate Akhil Sibal, with Advocates Vedanta Varma, Mannat Sandhu and Akhil Kumar Gola and for the Respondent by Senior Advocate Monika Arora, with Advocates Harsh Ahuja, Mr. Kushal Kumar and Mr. Praveen Singh. 

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