Appear for HSC without FYJC?

Two junior college students, who had availed of the ATKT facility to clear their Secondary School Certificate (SSC), exam, now seek that they be allowed to appear for the Higher Secondary School Certificate (HSC) exams this year, against the education board regulation disallowing them to do so, which they have challenged in the Bombay high court.

Shubham Bhosale and Parthasarthy Sawant, both studying science, had failed their SSC exams in 2009. However, they availed of the ATKT system and took admission for FYJC in 2009. In October 2009, they passed their SSC exams.

Their colleges gave them admission to the SYJC in 2010, in spite of the fact that they had not cleared their FYJC exams.

However, they sought to appear for their HSC exams privately, which are scheduled to be conducted in February 2011, and accordingly filled up the forms. The Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education rejected their forms in September and October respectively.

The reason for the rejection was that as per regulation 89 of the Maharashtra Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Boards Regulation 1977, a candidate who has passed SSC with ATKT cannot appear as a private candidate before completing two years from the date of passing the SSC exam.

The students in their petition to the high court stated that “If such a restriction is imposed, then the candidate stands to lose an important year.”

The petition challenges the constitutional validity of regulation 89 and hopes that the court may allow the students to appear for their HSC exams. The petition came up for hearing on Wednesday before the division bench who have directed the education board to file their reply on February 18.