Law student moves Bombay High Court seeking uniform examination pattern in Maharashtra Universities

A law student has moved the Bombay High Court seeking uniformity in examinations and timely declaration of results by universities in the State of Maharashtra [Balusha Bhasal & Anr. v. State of Maharashtra & Ors.]..The plea was mentioned before a vacation division bench, which permitted listing of the same on May 30 before a bench of Justices Milind Jadhav and Abhay Ahuja..The first-year law student Balusha Bhasal co-filed the petition with a social worker who had been approached by 10 other students.The grievance raised in the petition was that different universities were conducting their own exams with different patterns and schedules.The issue of conducting examination for the year 2022 was under consideration. The petitioners learnt that a decision had been taken at a meeting of all Vice Chancellors of non-agriculture universities to have uniformity in examinations and to have them offline.There were also other decisions taken such as gap of two days between two papers, and granting extra time amongst others.The minutes of such meeting were also circulated by the State Higher Education Department to all universities..The grievance raised in the plea by the petitioners was that not all universities were following the decisions of the minutes.The petitioners pointed out that with each university following its own academic calendar, there was no uniformity in the schedules.They also objected to the gap of two days between two papers which it said, will only prolong the process of examinations, including declaration of results.This was an additional issue for students who wanted to continue their studies abroad, the petitioners highlighted.The plea also suggested that the MCQ-based examination could not be placed on same footing as descriptive type of examination as it would be discriminatory and unreasonable towards students taking the two exams to compete against each other..The petitioners prayed for a uniform pattern of examination as well as uniform pattern of the academic calendars across the State.The petitioners also sought directions to ensure that results are declared within shortest possible time to ensure that deadlines laid down in academic calendars of international universities are not missed.