$~S.B.-1 * IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI + W.P.(C) 4519/2017 & CM No.19732/2017 % Date of decision: 23rd May, 2017 RAKESH KUMAR & ANR. ..... Petitioners Through: Mr. Balbir Singh, Sr. Adv. with Mr.

Abhishek Singh Baghel, Mr. Ashish Verma and Mr.Mukesh Bhutani, Advs. versus UNION OF INDIA & ORS. .... Respondents Through: Mr. Sanjay Jain, ASG with Mr. Amit Bansal, Ms. Rajul Jain, Ms. Manish Singh and Ms. Seema, Advs. for R-1 & 2.

Mr. Mohinder J.S. Rupal with Ms. Disha Malhotra, Advs. for University of Delhi.

CORAM:

HON'BLE THE ACTING CHIEF JUSTICE HON'BLE MS. JUSTICE PRATHIBA M. SINGH JUDGMENT (ORAL)

GITA MITTAL, ACTING CHIEF JUSTICE W.P.(C) 4519/2017

1. Issue notice to show cause as to why rule nisi be not issued to the respondents. Mr. Amit Bansal, ld. counsel accepts notice for respondents no.1 and 2.

2. We accept the oral prayer made by Mr. Sanjay Jain, ld. ASG and direct the impleadment of University of Delhi as party respondent no.6 in the present writ petition.

3. Mr. J.S. Rupal, ld. Standing Counsel for the University of Delhi who happens to be in court has been requested to accept notice. The served respondent shall file counter affidavits within six weeks. Rejoinder thereto, if any, be filed before the next date of hearing.

4. Subject to the petitioner taking steps, issue notice for the service of the unserved respondents.

5. List on 20th July, 2017.

CM No.19732/2017

6. This application is taken up for early hearing given the urgency in this matter which relates to the evaluation of the performance of students who have undertaken the Secondary School (class 10th) and the Senior Secondary School (Class 12th) Examination under the Central Board of Secondary Education (‘CBSE’ hereinafter), results whereof are likely to be declared any day. We have consequently heard Mr.Balbir Singh, learned Senior counsel for the petitioner and Mr.Sanjay Singh, ASG for respondents No.1 and 2.

7. The petitioners are aggrieved by the announcement made by the CBSE that for the present year i.e. 2016-17, the moderation policy, which was in vogue would not be adopted for these students. The petitioners have also made a grievance that this announcement has been revealed only from newspaper reports and that the policy change effected by the CBSE has not been announced or made available to the students nor has it been put in the public domain.

8. Mr. Sanjay Jain, learned ASG who appears for the respondent no.1 does not dispute that till the announcement of this policy, CBSE had a moderation policy for the Board Examination in place. Copy of the policy followed by the CBSE, which has been in vogue till date is placed as annexure P-1 at page 123 on record.

9. To understand the spirit, intendment and object of this policy, we extract hereunder the reasons as have been declared by the CBSE for the existing policy, which reads as follows:

“Moderation Policy of Board’s Examination Prior to declaration of results of Senor School Certificate (Class XII) and Secondary School (Class X) the Board adopts the Moderation Policy in the following manner:

a) To compensate the candidates for the difficulties experienced in solving the question in a specified time due to misinterpretation/ambiguity of questions and errors, if any, leading to multiplicity of performance and causing constraints on consumption of time for other questions.

b) To compensate the vagaries and to bring uniformity in the evaluation process.

c) To bring parity on account of element of subjectivity involved in the evaluation process.

d) To level up the mean achievements in the set-wise performance of the candidates attributable to the difference in the difficulty level of different sets of question papers in the multiple sets scheme.

e) To maintain a near parity of pass percentage of the candidates in the current year vis-à-vis preceding years, subject-wise and overall.”

10. So far as the change of policy which has been effected by the respondents is concerned, Mr. Sanjay Jain, learned ASG has handed o