New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday refused to set aside the University Grants Commission(UGC) guidelines which had said that final exams in colleges have to be conducted by September 30.
However, the court has granted liberty to states to postpone the exams amid the pandemic.
Upholding the UGC decision to hold final year exams, a bench headed by Justice Ashok Bhushan said that if any state feels they can't conduct exams by that date, they must approach the UGC for new dates to hold the exam.
Earlier, the University Grants Commission (UGC) had told the top court that its July 6 directive, asking universities and colleges to conduct final year exams by September 30 amid the COVID-19 pandemic, is "not a diktat" but states cannot take the decision to confer degrees without holding the examinations.
It had told the court that the directive is for the "benefit of students" as the universities have to start admissions to postgraduate courses and state authorities cannot override the UGC's guideline.
Assailing the decisions of some states like Maharashtra and Delhi to cancel final year examinations, the UGC had said that such decisions directly affect standards of higher education and will be an encroachment on the legislative field of coordinating and determining the standards of higher education that is exclusively reserved for Parliament under Schedule VII of the Constitution.
The UGC had said that final examination is a crucial step in the academic career of a student and the state government cannot say that its July 6 directive was not binding.
Yuva Sena, the youth wing of Shiv Sena, is one of the petitioners in the apex court and has questioned the UGC's directive to hold examinations during the pandemic times.
The UGC had earlier said that the July 6 guidelines are based on recommendations of experts and have been made after due deliberation and it is wrong to claim that it will not be possible to conduct the final examinations in terms of the guidelines.
(with inputs from agencies)
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