Whether CA Students Can Have Options Within Centres? Supreme Court Asks ICAI Counsel To Get Instructions

The Supreme Court on Monday adjourned to tomorrow the hearing on three petitions filed by various Chartered Accountant students seeking certain reliefs in relation to CA exams 2021 scheduled to start from July 5.

As the matter was taken by a bench comprising Justices AM Khanwilkar, Dinesh Maheshwari and Aniruddha Bose, Senior Advocate Ramji Srinivasan, appearing for the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India(ICAI), submitted that he has submitted yesterday night a brief note on the stand of ICAI.

However, the bench said that the said note has not reached it. Therefore, the bench decided to adjourn the matter to tomorrow.

At this juncture, Senior Advocate Meenakshi Arora, appearing in one of the petitions, requested the bench to ask the ICAI counsel to get instructions from the institute on one aspect.

"If I could place a few suggestions for the consideration of Srinivasan. What they have done is that they've unilaterally changed centred. The exam is on the 5th. If candidates can have options within the centres then it will be helpful since exams are going to start on July 5. Let the ICAI take instructions on that", Senior Advocate Arora submitted.

"Have you taken note of these suggestions", Justice Khanwhilkar asked ICAI's counsel Senior Advocate Ramji Srinivasan.

Senior Advocate Srinivasan submitted that the note submitted by him addresses this issue.

The bench will consider the petitions tomorrow.

The bench was considering the petitions Sathya Narayan Perumal vs Union of India(in which Sr Av Arora was appearing), Anubha Shrivastava Sahai vs Union of India and Amit Jain vs Union of India.

Read the report about the note submitted by the ICAI here -  "Opt Out Option" Available If Examinee Or Family Infected With COVID On Or After June 21 : ICAI Tells Supreme Court

Plea For Opt Out Option:

The plea by Child Right Activist Anubha Shrivastava Sahai sought directions to provide an "Opt Out" option to all the aspirants going to appear in the exams willing to opt out before and during the exam, with a carry forward of all benefits. The plea has also sought an extra chance to candidates appearing for the intermediate and final exams under the old syllabus.

The petitioner has sought directions for increasing the number of Examination Centres for CA Exams so as to ensure that at least one Examination Centre is kept in every District of India and not more than 50 students are allotted one Centre.

The Petitioner has also sought formulation and implementation of specific MHA guidelines for CA Examinations, free medical treatment to students infected during examination, conducting examinations in a staggered manner and free vaccination for all the students/candidates and other staff , invigilators amongst various other welfare measures.

Plea by 22 CA Students for Alternate Attempt and Revised SOP:

The plea moved through Advocates Hardik Gautam and Divyansh Tiwari sought directions to the Centre and Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) to formulate revised Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to be adopted in the examination centres across India. (Sathya Narayan Perumal vs UOI)

The plea also sought direction to the ICAI to provide an option of alternate attempt to any candidate who fails to appear in the July, 2021 examinations on account of any impediment, caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Plea For Exam in Two Cycles:

Other than an Opt Out Option, the plea has sought directions for examinations for all the courses to be conducted in two cycles i.e, "July, 2021- Cycle I and July, 2021-Cycle II", as was done for the November Cycle of CA examinations, 2020. (Amit Jain and Ors vs ICAI)

The plea filed by a Chartered Accountant and 17 candidates through Adv Nirnimesh Dube, has sought the direction to provide the candidates who may fail to appear in the July 2021 examinations on account of any impediment, caused by the Covid-19, an alternate attempt by carrying forward their candidature to the alternate cycle.

It may be noted that over 6,000 Chartered Accountancy aspirants also recently wrote to CJI NV Ramana seeking directions to ICAI to provide an Opt-Out option to the students who are unable to appear for the exams due to COVID-19, increase the number of attempts for Old Course Students and conduct an additional examination attempt for students who are unable to appear.

The letter had urged the CJI to take suo-moto cognisance of the matter, club their application with the present PIL and list the matter under extremely urgent category as the exams are going to begin from 5th July and admit cards are to be released soon.