New Delhi, August 17
Overruling the Punjab and Haryana High Court’s directive to send the entire question paper of the Punjab Pre-medical Entrance Test (PMET) to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) for determining the correctness of “key answers” set out by Guru Nanak Dev University (GNDU), the Supreme Court today ordered fresh examination of only 10 answers by the CBSE and Delhi University (DU) simultaneously.

These 10 answers were the same regarding which the CBSE had earlier expressed its opinion, when referred to it by the High Court. But it was stated in the apex court today by counsel for various litigating parties that the GND varsity had not sent the original questions of the 21 alleged incorrect answers to the CBSE, which found 10 out of them as wrong on the basis of the questions as re-produced in the affidavits of the students who challenged their veracity in the High Court and on the basis of the questions referred in the counter affidavit of the university.

In view of this, a Bench of Mr Justice Y.K. Sabharwal, Mr Justice B.N. Srikrishna and Mr Justice P.P. Naolekar directed that the correctness of only 10 “key answers” would be determined afresh by the CBSE as well as DU and the GND Varsity was asked to supply to these institutions the entire set of the question paper along with the key answers set out by its experts.

The CBSE and DU were directed to submit their reports by August 20 while fixing the next hearing on August 23 when the outcome of the fresh examination would be known and further direction would be issued by the court accordingly.

“The experts of the CBSE and DU shall give their opinion on the basis of the questions prepared by the GND varsity. If key answers to those 10 questions are not found to be correct, they will say what are the correct answers,” the Bench said.

The key answers sought to be re-examined are in respect of the questions at serial number 1, 2, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 16 of the question paper set out by the GND varsity for 2005-06 Punjab PMET to fill 2,600 seats in different colleges for the MBBS, BDS, ayurvedic and homeopathic courses under Baba Farid University to which all medical institutions in the state were affiliated. The responsibility to conduct the PMET was cast upon the GND varsity by the state government after the leakage of the question paper from Baba Farid University earlier, resulting in the cancellation of its exam.

While GND varsity counsel Manoj Swaroop contended that the CBSE had given its opinion earlier on the basis of questions as referred to in the affidavit of the petitioner students and therefore, should not be termed as a correct opinion. But this was countered by Baba Farid University’s counsel Anupam Gupta, who claimed that the CBSE was supplied with affidavits of both the GND varsity and the students in which the alleged 21 questions were re-produced and this was amply reflected in the High Court’s order.

Since the issue could not be settled on the basis of the CBSE’s report, in which it had pointed out the incorrectness of only 10 key answers, the High Court had on August 2 ordered that the entire PMET paper containing 200 questions be referred to the CBSE to determine as how many wrong key answers had been set out by the GND varsity.