The Bombay High Court recently granted permission for the admission process of Master of Business Administration (MBA) courses in the state to begin from July 7. However, the court has clarified that admissions will be subject to the outcome of a petition filed by a group of over 150 students. Hindustan Time reported that this petition questions the method used by the state Common Entrance Test (CET) cell for normalizing marks.
Anomalies in Mark Normalization Process
During the petition hearing, it was brought to the attention of the division bench of Justice Gautam Patel and Justice Neela Gokhale that there were irregularities in the mark normalization process employed while declaring the results of MBA-CET. The students contended that they were placed at a disadvantage due to this process, resulting in lower marks than expected.
Petitioners from Rescheduled Test Batch
The advocate general, Birendra Saraf, informed the bench that some of the petitioners were among the candidates from batch 1, which had appeared for the CET rescheduled test in May. These students approached the High Court seeking redress after encountering various issues during their initial test. Saraf also revealed that a total of 11,562 candidates had participated in the retest held on May 6. Dissatisfied with the results announced on June 23, these candidates demanded that the entire process be discarded, advocating for a fresh CET to be conducted for all one lakh students. However, Saraf argued that fulfilling this demand would cause a delay of two to three months, thereby affecting the admission process set to begin on July 7.
Technical Glitches and Grievances
The MBA CET, conducted in March, had four batches designated by the CET Cell. Unfortunately, candidates from the first batch encountered technical glitches, leading them to approach the High Court seeking a fair opportunity to take the test. Following this, the CET Cell received a staggering 30,000 grievances, prompting them to organize a fresh test on May 6, which was attended by 11,562 aspirants.
Challenges with Normalization of Scores
Upon the declaration of results on June 23, some candidates who had taken the retest approached the High Court, claiming that their scores had diminished compared to their performance in the initial test. They attributed this decline to the method adopted by the CET Cell for normalizing scores. The CET Cell had implemented the normalization process to ensure fairness among all batches. Moreover, they contended that the entire MBA CET was fundamentally flawed and, therefore, should be invalidated, necessitating a fresh CET for all aspiring candidates.
As of now, the court has ruled that admissions would proceed as per the schedule, pending the outcome of the petition. The next hearing is scheduled for July 10.
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