HC notices to student, teachers

In a case of meddling with an architecture student’s assessment sheet, Bombay High Court on Thursday issued show cause notices to Rajan Lakule, principal of Sir JJ College of Arts, three professors of architecture and the student who sought information through an RTI application, asking them to explain why criminal prosecution should not be initiated against them.

Anshu Chaudhari, a fourth-year student at Academy of Architecture (Rachana Sansad) at Prabhadevi, had moved the court challenging the March 2007 order of vice-chancellor of Mumbai University Vijay Khole who had held that even after re-verification it was established that she secured 200 out of 450 marks in her vivas for the Architectural Design paper in 2006. The passing marks were 225.

Chaudhari had contended that she was a meritorious student and the allowed to keep term (ATKT) would strip her off her scholarship.

Through an RTI application, Chaudhari, a resident of Forgett Road in South Mumbai, found out that although the examiners’ figure in the internal marks register was 280, it was mistaken to be 200. She had further contended that the four jurors appointed for the re-verification of her marks — Lakule and professors Shakti Parmar, Aniruddha
Paul, MM Dalvi — were of the view that she had secured 280 marks and not 200.

Counsel for the university Rui Rodrigues told the court on Thursday that the vice-chancellor had relied on the opinion of a handwriting expert who had said that the assessment sheet was “altered or corrected”. He added that the Board of Examinations too had agreed with the vice-chancellor’s view.

Viewing that the marks were tampered with Justice Bilal Nazki and justice AP Bhangale issued notices to the four jurors and Chaudhari.

They have been given four weeks to reply to the notices.