Madras High Court Rejects Appeal Seeking Re-Exam For Candidates Affected By Power Outage In Chennai

The bench of Justice J Nisha Banu and Justice M Jothiraman dismissed the enchantment filed by a gaggle of scholars, claiming that their efficiency was hindered because of the heavy rainfall and poor administration by the middle.

The court docket perused the order of the Nationwide Testing Company, which was handed after conducting a subject verification of the examination centres. The court docket stated it has to uphold the integrity of the academic assessments in conducting examinations and it couldn’t sit in enchantment over the choice of the NTA, until it was manifestly arbitrary, particularly since a re-examination would have an effect on greater than 2 million different college students.

Thus, the court docket noticed that there was no cause to intrude with the choice of the one decide and, dismissed the enchantment.

“This Courtroom is of the opinion that it’s essential to uphold the integrity of the academic assessments in conducting examinations and this Courtroom can’t sit in an appellate jurisdiction towards the thought-about choice of the talking order handed by the NTA, after subject verification of examination centre and statistical evaluation by an unbiased knowledgeable committee with no affiliation to the NTA, until such choice is demonstrated to be manifestly arbitrary, mala fide or unlawful. In such circumstances, if any re-examination is permitted, the identical would severely have an effect on greater than two million candidates. Due to this fact, we don’t discover any cause to intrude with the order impugned and the writ enchantment lacks benefit and the identical is liable to be dismissed,” the court docket noticed

The scholars submitted that the uncomfortable and distracting atmosphere affected their capacity to focus on the examination, hampering their capacity to carry out. It was additionally submitted that even after such an incident, the scholars weren’t given any further time and so they weren’t in a position to full the examination. The scholars thus submitted that their reliable expectation of being supplied with sufficient services was hindered. It was contended that the scholars who appeared for the examination on the affected centres had been at an obstacle in comparison with different college students who wrote the examination at totally different centres.

The NTA, however, submitted that although there was a short energy outage, it might not have affected the efficiency of the scholars because the examination was performed within the daytime and there was ample pure mild within the examination centres. It was submitted that the scholars weren’t moved from their seats, and the disruption was minor. The NTA additionally submitted screenshots of CCTV footage to point out that the examination centres had giant home windows with glass panels permitting ample ambient daylight to enter.

The court docket famous that the NTA had performed a subject verification of the examination centre with the Centre Superintendent, Metropolis Coordinator, NTA-appointed Observers and Invigilators on responsibility within the examination halls, and in addition obtained written factual studies from all key functionaries deployed on the stated centre. The court docket perused the detailed talking order of the NTA primarily based on the sector verification, which clearly confirmed that the examination was not hindered.

Thus, contemplating all of the elements, the court docket dismissed the enchantment after noting that there was cause to intrude with the one decide’s order.

Counsel for Appellant: Mr.T. Saikrishnan

Counsel for Respondents: Mr.AR.L.Sundaresan Further Solicitor Normal assisted by Mr.M.Sathyan Central Authorities Standing Counsel, Mrs.Sunitha Kumar Standing Counsel for NTA, Ms.Subharanjani Anand

Case Title: S. Sai Priya and Others v. Union of India and Others

Quotation: 2025 LiveLaw (Mad) 227

Case No: WA No. 1707 of 2025