The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Revalue all TNPCEE answer papers: court

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jun 16, 2004

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Revalue all TNPCEE answer papers: court

By Our Staff Reporter

CHENNAI, JUNE 15. Putting an end to the long-drawn litigation over the controversial deletion of over 20 questions in the 2004 Tamil Nadu Professional Courses Entrance Examinations (TNPCEE), the Madras High Court today asked Anna University to revalue all answer papers. It also laid down guidelines for valuing eight specific questions.

As per the order delivered by Justice Prafulla Kumar Misra, questions 27 and 33 in Biology (version code MA-7) and questions 11, 64 and 77 in Physical Science (version code BS-6) shall not be deleted. They shall be valued and marks awarded to any student who has indicated any of the correct answers.

Question 76 in Physical Science (BS-6) is to be evaluated and credit given to students who gave the correct option as per the answer key. Question 105 in Biology (MA-7) is to be revalued on the basis that option 4 is the correct answer, and not option 3 as indicated by a university expert committee.

Mr. Justice Misra also ruled that question 117 in version code BS-6 be deleted from consideration.

No redistribution of marks

Disapproving of redistributing the marks of deleted questions among the correct ones, he said, "by deleting such questions a less meritorious student who has indicated a wrong option would receive the same benefit as a student who has indicated a correct option. It would not advance the cause of justice and fair play. It would defeat the very purpose for which such examinations are held."

A student who answered correctly should not be penalised for the mistake of the paper setter, the judge said. He should not be treated on a par with a student who opted for a wrong answer to the same question. "It is, therefore, directed that questions containing more than one correct answer be not deleted. Instead, credit should be given to the candidate who has indicated any of the correct answers," the judge ruled.

Percentage calculation

The university is now required to find out the number of correct questions to be evaluated and after awarding marks to the students as per the original value of each question, it will have to find out the proportion or percentage with reference to 50 for the particular stream.

For example, if the correct number of questions is 138 and a person has answered 130 questions correctly, the percentage of marks obtained by such person vis-a-vis the total number of correct questions is to be calculated and the ultimate value with reference to 50 is to be credited to such person's account in the particular stream.

The judge, however, upheld the expert committee's recommendation to delete questions 80 (version code BS-6), 106 (BS-6), 64 (BS-6), 77 (BS-6), 20 (BS-6), 29 (BS-6), 94 (BS-6), 76 (BS-6), 87 (BS-6), 88 (BS-6), 116 (BS-6), 119 (BS-6), 129 (MA-7), 18 (BS-6), 45 (BS-6), 30 (BS-6), 8 (BS-6), 12 (BS-6), 22 (BS-6), 99 (MA-7) and 117 (BS-6).

Applicable to all

Mr. Justice Misra, pointing out that the university had been restrained from releasing the merit list, said the present order was applicable to all students, including those who had not come to the court.

He, however, clarified that as per paragraph 9 of "Instructions to Candidates", there would be no mark if there were multiple shadings for a question. Such questions would be treated as unanswered.

In the course of his 51-page order, Mr. Justice Misra rejected several suggestions by the petitioners' counsel, including the one calling for a fresh entrance examination. Stating that the remedy would be worse than the disease, he reasoned that there was no guarantee of such mistakes not recurring if a fresh examination were held. It would mean another spell of examination stress on students and result in further delay in finalising the selection and admission to professional courses.

Another suggestion that marks obtained in the qualifying examinations alone be taken into account for admission to professional courses also did not find favour with Mr. Justice Misra. "If the common entrance test is done away with, the basic structure of the method of selection would be destroyed," he said, pointing out that it ensured parity among students from different streams of education. He also rejected a suggestion to refer the impugned questions to another expert committee.

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