Aarohi Girish Dhumale
On September 23rd, 2024, the Karnataka High Court directed the Karnataka State Law University (KSLU), to grant students marks that they obtained in revaluation of their answer sheets, to enable them to pass their examinations.
The petitions filed by Arpita J. and other students were allowed by a single-judge bench of Justice S R Krishna Kumar. The Court directed the KSLU to grant the marks obtained through revaluation to the students without going into merits and demerits of the rival contentions regarding the validity, legality, or correctness of Regulation 1.3.6 of the impugned notification. The Court directed that these marks be granted within two weeks.
The Court also directed the University to consider amending Clause 1.3.6 as follows: a.) If the marks awarded in revaluation differ from the original award on either side by not more than five percent of the maximum marks of the paper/subject the better of the two awards shall be accepted as the awards after revaluation.
b.) If the marks awarded in revaluation exceed the original award by more than five percent and not more than 15 percent of the maximum marks of the paper/subject the candidate will be given the benefit to an extent of five percent of the marks for paper/subject in full plus half of the remaining difference.
The Court observed that these rules shall not apply to the reevaluated marks if a student applies for valuation under the Rule 2.1 of this same ordinance.
The petitioners had challenged this notification, stating that it is irrational, illogical, unfair, unjust, and manifestly arbitrary. They contended that the notification contradicts its own clause 2.1. References were made to the revaluation guidelines of NLSIU and Christ University. They requested that KSLU should also follow the same procedure.
KSLU, on the other hand, argued that the petition lacks merit and is liable to be dismissed. The Court allowed the petition and said that it shall not have any precedential value as it is decided only on the facts of this case.
Case Title: Arpita J V. State and of Karnataka & Others
Case No: WP 21704/2024, WP 21452/2024, WP 25149/2024
Bench: Justice S R Krishna Kumar