Gujarat HC cancels existing percentile method for engineering admissions

Ahmedabad, 20 June, 2014

The Gujarat High Court has today in its order directed the state government to give admissions in engineering through percentage based merit(percentile multiplied by percentage and then by counting 60%) instead of present percentile based method.

High Court’s today’s decision has been welcomed by large number of Gujarat based students. They believe it will provide better opportunity to state students.

Petitioner Vinod Pandya said that due to the faulty method of calculating percentile ranks, students from various classes and board are not able to get admission based on scores in their respective board exams. He said the method of admission in 2014-15 for preparing a combined merit list for students seeking admission in engineering is ex-facie illegal, unjust, arbitrary and violative of article 14 of the constitution of India. Hence, it has to be set aside.

On Pandya’s plea the High Court had issued notices last month to the education department, commissioner of technical education and Admission Committee for Professional Courses(ACPC) regarding discrepancies in calculation of percentile for admission in BTech.

The state government had in response defended its system of calculating the percentile of students from different boards for admission in engineering courses and urged the Gujarat high court to turn down the PIL that demands a change in the percentile calculation method.

In response to the PIL by Vinod Pandya, which sought implementation of the normalization method as laid down by the high court last year, the government had submitted that there was no protest from parents as far as this calculation method is concerned. The government also said that since the issue is pending before the Supreme Court, the HC should refrain from hearing the PIL at this juncture.

In a rebuttal, the petitioner filed a reply and maintained that the litigation pending before the apex court was based on three petitions filed by students in their personal interest. He reiterated his stand and explained how students who passed their higher secondary from Gujarat Board are at a loss in comparison with central boards. Pandya also contended that the admission committee for professional courses and state government admitted before the apex court that the system adopted by them was erroneous, and they have revised the process of normalization.

The High Court has given direction that admissions should be given through the method of percentile multiplied by percentage and then by counting 60%.