The entitlement of a student to full marks in certain questions and the application of 'standardization of marks' were central legal principles established in the judgment.

JUDGMENT

Rakesh Kumar Jain, J. - The petitioner, a student of Bhavan Vidyalaya School, Sector 27, Chandigarh, had appeared in Class XII examination conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education [for short 'the CBSE'] in the month of March-April, 2018 and secured 460 out of 500 marks in the result declared on 26.5.2018. She was not satisfied with her marks in 4 subjects, namely, English Core, Economics, Business Studies and Accounts. As per the procedure provided by the CBSE for re-evaluation, the student has to first apply for re-verification of marks in which marks are only calculated of each question subject to payment of 500/- per subject. If the student is not satisfied with the re-verification, he/she can obtain a photocopy of his/her answer-sheet on payment of 700/- per answer-sheet but the answer sheet can be obtained only by those students who had applied for re-verification of their marks. The answer key of each subject is also uploaded on the website of the CBSE for reference of the students and thereafter, the student can apply for re-evaluation in which the answers for the specific questions are re-checked and if it is found to be correct then the marks are accordingly awarded but for the purpose of re-evaluation, the student has to mandatorily apply for obtaining the photocopy of answer-sheet with the payment of 100/- per question.

2. The petitioner had allegedly applied for re-verification of her marks in four subjects and paid requisite fee of 2000/- on 1.6.2018. She was informed on 4.6.2018 that no mistake was found in calculation of marks. Thereafter, she applied on 15.6.2018 for obtaining photocopy of answer-sheets and paid requisite fee of 2800/- on the same day and received the same on 20.6.2018. She had allegedly compared her answers with the answer-key of each subject, obtained from the website of the CBSE, and when she realized that she had not been awarded correct marks for some of the questions, applied for re-evaluation of answers of three subjects, namely, English Core, Economics and Business Studies and paid 2500/- for re-evaluation of 25 questions on 23.6.2018. On 5.7.2018, the petitioner received the result of re-evaluation wherein she was informed that her marks have been revised in two subjects. In the subject of English Core (Subject Code 301), her marks were increased from 86 to 93 and in the subject of Economics (subject Code 030) her marks were increased from 72 to 78 but in regard to the subject of Business Studies (subject Code 054), no mistake was found in the re-evaluation. As a result therefore, the marks of the petitioner were increased from 460/ 500 marks (92%) to 473/500 (94.6%). The petitioner is still not satisfied with the re-evaluation of her answer-sheet of the subject of Business Studies (subject Code 54) more particularly in regard to questions No.11, 12 & 18. She has given the details of the question and answer of the aforesaid three questions in the writ petition, which is reproduced as under: -