DU Examination: Delhi HC issues notice to Common Service Centre to ascertain their preparedness; Issue of OBE to be heard after SC hearing

The Delhi High Court today issued notice to Common Service Centre Academy which has been engaged by the Delhi University to enable outstation final year students to sit for online open-book examination. .The Court has directed the CEO, CSC Academy to list all the centres which would be used for the examination and state their preparedness..The order was passed by a single Judge Bench of Justice Prathiba M Singh after issues regarding the poor condition of infrastructure at CSCs was brought to its notice. .The Court was informed that the CSC were run at village panchayat level in the form of a public cafe. They were not run by professionals as such, it was added. .Senior Advocate Sachin Dutta who represents Delhi University stated that the CSCs functioned under the aegis of the Ministry of Information Technology, Government of India. On being asked, Advocate M Rupal added that Delhi Univeristy had signed an MoU with the CSC Academy to provide logistical assistance to it for the purpose of the online examination amid COVID-19. .The counsel for intervenor students today also pointed out that as could be seen from the circular on the conduction of mock exams, the University was not complying with the earlier orders on sending the question paper by email, stopping the clock for 30 mins in case of a technical glitch etc. .Senior Adocate Dutta assured the Court that all its order would be duly complied with. He stated that the first mock was only for the limited purpose of "downloading and uploading" the question paper. .Whenever real-time test it conducted, these directions shall be followed, he said. .On the last date of hearing, the Court had asked UGC to clarify if MCQs, Assignments, Presentation etc were permitted to be conducted for final year students..[UGC Guidelines] Supreme Court to hear tomorrow pleas challenging UGC Guidelines mandating Final-Year University Exams by September end .Solictor General Tuhsar Mehta today informed the Court that challenges to the UGC guidelines on several grounds were pending before the Supreme Court and were likely to come up for hearing soon. .In view of the same, even the Division Bench headed by Justice Hima Kohli deferred hearing till Tuesday in matters concerning final year examination in Delhi University, he informed. .The Court opined that the cases before it and the Supreme Court might have certain overlapping issues and considered it appropriate to defer hearing. .While the issues of mock tests and CSCs would be taken up on July 27, the main petition will be heard on July 30.