SC refuses to stay counselling for admission to National Law Universities through CLAT

The Supreme Court on Friday refused to stay the counselling of candidates for admission to 23 National Law Universities through the Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) on ground of wrong questions and technical glitches.

A bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan and M R Shah allowed the petitioner Lavanya Bhatt and others to approach the grievance redressal committee with a fresh representation within two days, saying we cannot pass any interim order.

The court also noted a retired Chief Justice of India-headed panel would look into grievances.

Senior advocate P S Narasimha, appearing for Consortium of the National Law Universities, pointed out that out of 2,600 seats, 1800 seats have already been filled, while the counselling is on for the rest of seats.

He maintained that the examination has been conducted excellently well on September 28 and all Vice Chancellors have participated in the process.

One question in the examination was if defamation is a crime or not, the objection was answer is not as per what Google said, the counsel added.

Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for the petitioner contended that this year has been the worst ever in conducting CLAT. Other online examinations were also held this year. The Consortium said it had received 21,000 objections.

"In lot of questions, wrong model answers were given. The cut off in this exam is not even 0 but -4. This must not have happened in this exam but in the history of any other examinations," he said, alleging the Consortium was incompetent to hold the all India test.

The students who have got marks as -4, they have been called for counselling, he said.

Narasimha, for his part, said retired Chief Justice would look into these objections. The list, shown by the counsel, was only for the SC/ ST candidates and they have been only called for the interview, which made no difference.

He said during the pandemic, there cannot be unending counselling.

The counsel also pointed about five questions were dropped by the experts panel on recommendation of experts panel.

So far as software glitches was concerned, this was an extraordinary examination. Even a movement of mouse by the student was recorded, he maintained.