SC:Admissions Do Not Include Rounding Off Of Marks

The Supreme Court on Tuesday announced that when an eligibility criteria is prescribed in a qualifying examination, must be strictly abide by. Faced with divergent views expressed by different high courts on issue of 'Rounding off' of marks such as 54.70% as 55%, the court said there can't be any rounding off of marks for permitting a candidate to be eligible for advanced studies.

A bench of Justices AK Patnaik and Ranjana Prakash Desai held while allowing an appeal filed by Bangalore-based Rajiv Gandhi University of Health sciences said that "Any dilution or tempering with it will work injustice on other candidates".

The university was aggrieved by a Karnataka high court's other to round off the marks of one G Hemalatha and other PG Nursing students, thus making them eligible for the admission. Initially, the students were permitted for the course even though they had secured 54.71% against qualifying eligibility of 55%. However, the university later cancelled their admission.

On having pursued the various judgements on the issue, the supreme court said 'Rounding-off is impermissible'. While taking note of the fact that the aggrieved PG students are also working in a government hospital the bench said "We make it clear that this order merely settles the question of law and shall not have any adverse impact, in any manner, on the service of student Hemalatha".