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The Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed the plea filed by Private/Patrachar/2nd Compartment seeking review of their plea for cancellation of CBSE Board Exams.

A Division Bench of Justice AM Khanwilkar and Justice Dinesh Maheshwari while dismissing the review petition in its order said, 

“The present review petition has been filed against the final judgment and order dated June 22, 2021. We have perused the review petition as well as grounds for review in support thereof. In our opinion, no case of review is made out. The review petition is accordingly dismissed.”

Private/Patrachar/ 2nd Compartment students had approached Supreme Court seeking review of the judgment dated June 22, 2021, wherein the bench headed by Justice AM Khanwilkar dismissed the intervention application filed by Private and compartment students of CBSE seeking cancellation of Class XII private/compartment/ repeaters CBSE Board Exams.

It was that conducting the exam of these students in the month of August 15, 2021, to September 15, 2021, and the declaration of their results in the month of October 2021 would result in forfeiture of the fees deposited by those students and cancellation of admission for those students who wish to seek admission in foreign universities.

“Present review being sought by the applicants will bring a smile not only on the innocent faces of the students of class XII but on the faces of their parents as well as judges of this Hon’ble Court for meeting out the grievances of the innocent school children of the categories mentioned without any delay”, plea stated.

The plea preferred by Advocate Mamta Sharma through Advocate on Record Rameshwar Prasad Goyal stated that the notification dated June 1, 2021, issued by CBSE in respect of cancellation of Class XII examination did not have any specification in respect of cancellation of exams of regular students only and not Private/Patrachar/ 2nd Compartment students. 

While relying on the apex court judgment in Navtej Singh Johar v. Union of India (2018) 10 SCC 1, Advocate Mamta in her review plea has averred that the distinction made by CBSE between class 12th regular and Private/Patrachar/ 2nd Compartment students are without a basis, unreasonable and arbitrary clearly in contravention of Article 14 and Article 21 of the Constitution of India, 1950.

The petitioner thereafter along with seeking review of the judgment and order dated June 22, 2021, to the extent of Private/Patrachar/Compartment students had also sought for striking down, “clause 29” of Policy Decision dated June 17, 2021, as notified by CBSE. Relief has also been sought to provide open court hearing to the applicants to make submissions on important questions of law and facts which couldn't be brought before the Court at the time of the previous hearing which needs consideration.

Case Title: Abhigya Anand through Father & Guardian & Ors v. CBSE