Act fast to get your marks re-evaluated. Court orders have been sympathetic to students

We tell you the story of one Ms Molly, a young girl from Kerala and of her Kerala University. It is one of those vagaries of fortune, rather misfortune, that descend on someone totally unversed with such adversities. Ms Molly was just a student. And she had to take on the might of the institution where she studied.

Some time back,

Ms Molly had a setback. She lived in Kerala, amongst the country’s the most educated citizenry. If the saying that higher the level of education, the greater the recourse to courts of justice, is true,
Ms Molly lived up to it. She took on the bastion of education, her own university. But why?

Ms Molly was a young, aspiring girl. She went to college and studied hard. She took her exams. But did not get the marks she expected. Now, Ms Molly was an angry little girl. The University had failed her, not by way of the marks it had given her, but by dishonouring her commitment.

The University had a system of revaluation. It allowed the students to ask for their papers to be corrected once again in the hope of getting better marks. Now, there is often a problem with corrections. Not the correction itself but the noting down of marks in the aggregation column. Some marks get missed, or are not written by the evaluator. Or, just incorrectly totalled. It is what we call ‘human error’. And just as in court where no litigant can suffer because of a fault of the court, no student can suffer for the mistake of the institution of education.

Ms Molly filed an appeal. She asked for revaluation of her marks. She had high hopes and other exams to take. The next one was not far away. To facilitate such a student, the University had originally set a time limit of a maximum of 45-days to announce the revaluation results.

In an earlier case, the University had taken a year, from April 1984 to June 1985, to announce the revaluation results. The court had held that was incorrect, especially since the 45-day limit had been substantially breached and the student, one Ms Pai, had also missed the September exam. So what had the University done to remedy the situation? Hard to believe, but it simply got rid of the 45-day rule! Now, what was Ms Molly to do?

You be the judge.

Ms Molly went to court. The court appointed an amicus curiae, i.e., a friend of the court. He was advocate V Chidambaresh. With his help, the court came to a decision. It favoured
Ms Molly, 45-day rule or not. It rightly held that the preceding case was a good harbinger and had to be followed. Revaluation must be fast. Fast enough to allow the student to appear for the next exam, whatever it may be. The student had lost a year. The student had to be compensated. She was awarded Rs10,000/-.

This holds a lesson for Moneylife readers. Act fast and apply for revaluation. But understand that a revaluation can also mean lesser marks. There might have been an error, whereby the student may have been awarded higher marks initially. There is also the possibility of a failure, following the revaluation.

Can cut both ways.

[An interesting aside is a recent case where a litigant was awarded an interim (in between) monetary relief. Well-wishers egged him on to appeal the order, asking for 10 times as much. We advised him to confirm with his solicitor if the appeal could result in a reversal, either total or partial. After a lot of discussion, the man realised that he was treading on thin ice. Thankfully, he backed out. And saved a few lakh rupees, too.]

Bapoo Malcolm is a practising lawyer in Mumbai. Please email your comments to [email protected] or [email protected]