The Hindu : National : Not enough material to scrap PG medical test: court

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Apr 04, 2006

National

National

Not enough material to scrap PG medical test: court

J. Venkatesan

CBI gets time to probe unfair means

New Delhi : Even as the Centre on Monday sought permission to scrap the all-India postgraduate medical entrance test conducted by the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences, the Supreme Court said prima facie no material was placed before it to cancel the examination and hold a fresh one.

While rejecting the plea at this stage, a Bench, comprising Justices K.G. Balakrishnan and P.P. Naolekar, granted time till April 13 for the Central Bureau of Investigation to probe the allegations of unfair means adopted at all examination centres.

The Bench told Additional Solicitor-General Gopal Subramaniam, who appeared for the Centre, that the material supplied in respect of the investigation conducted in Chennai and the proposed probe in Delhi was not sufficient to scrap the test. It asked him to file a report on the status of investigation by April 13 so that the court could consider the application for a fresh test.

The Bench was hearing a petition filed by 12 successful candidates, who appeared in the all-India test, for a direction to the Government not to cancel the results.

Mr. Subramanian said the Government wanted to cancel the examination in the larger public interest and to maintain the sanctity of one of the most prestigious examinations. The CBI report said 22 students at Chennai centres had used ingenious methods for copying the question paper and answers were sent to other candidates on SMS using mobile phones.

Appearing for the students, senior counsel Arun Jaitley said merely because 22 of the 36,945 students used unfair means the whole examination should not be cancelled. Out of 4,188 students who passed the test, only 11.34 per cent had appeared at the Chennai centres and of them 10.25 per cent, i.e 421 students passed the test.

"Why should the successful students be made to suffer for the unfair means adopted by 22 students? Let them investigate the matter in respect of other centres and if they find something extraordinary, the court can consider scrapping the entire test. If it is a localised problem, it can be dealt with by taking appropriate action against the 22 students."

Successful Medical Dental Surgery (MDS) candidates requested the court to let them get admission, as there was no allegation of malpractices in their examination, held at centres different from those where the all-India postgraduate medical entrance test was conducted.

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