HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE A. RAJASHEKER REDDY Writ Petition No.20995 of 2014 Date: 08-10-2014 Between:
Ganesh Nagendra Kantimahanthi .. Petitioner AND The Government of Andhra Pradesh, represented by its Secretary for Intermediate Education, Hyderabad and another .. Respondents HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE A. RAJASHEKER REDDY Writ Petition No.20995 of 2014 ORDER:
This writ petition is filed for a mandamus declaring the action of the 2nd respondent Board and its officials in not awarding the eligible marks correctly in respect of Chemistry Paper-II and Mathematics Part-II (A) of Intermediate Public Examination March, 2014 as illegal and arbitrary and for a consequential direction to the 2nd respondent Board to declare that the petitioner is eligible for 4 marks each for Q.Nos.20 and 21 of Mathematics Paper-II (A) and 8 marks for Chemistry Paper-II.
2. The case of the petitioner is that he studied Intermediate in M.P.C. stream from Sri Chaitanya Junior College, East Point Colony, Visakhapatnam and secured total 914 marks out of 1000 marks in Intermediate Examination for the Academic years 2012- 2014 with Hall Ticket No.1402215227 i.e. both I year and II year and as the petitioner has doubt about awarding of marks in English, Mathematics and Chemistry of II year, he applied for re- verification by paying requisite fee to the 2nd respondent Board for Chemistry Paper-II and Mathematics II (A) Paper as he is confident of getting more marks as per the key and also the answers as prescribed in Telugu Academy Text books. It is stated that the 2nd respondent through its memo dated 17-05-2014 informed the petitioner that he was awarded 62 marks (same marks) for Mathematics Paper-II (A), 34 marks (2 marks were added) for Chemistry Paper-II and 90 marks (3 marks were added) for English Paper-II and by addition of above marks in English Paper-II and Chemistry Paper-II, the petitioner obtained 919 marks out of 1000 in both the years of Intermediate. It is also stated that on perusal of photocopies of the answer sheets of the Mathematics Paper-II (A) and Chemistry Paper-II by the professors, who are experts in the respective subjects, and of Sri Chaitanya Junior College faculty, opined and came to conclusion that for answers to Question No.20 and 21 in the Mathematics Paper-II (A) the marks awarded to each question are less by 3 marks for 7 marks question for the reason that the answer of Question No.21 is tallying exactly with the prescribed Telugu Academy Text book. It is further stated that originally the marks awarded to the Question Nos.20 and 21 by the valuator and the 2nd respondent herein, the original marks of 4 for each question were reduced to 3 marks for each question by striking off of 4 marks and also a question mark was noted and that by virtue of striking off, he lost 2 marks for the above two questions and that in respect of Chemistry Paper-II also, the answers to the Questions 12, 18 and 20 the marks were awarded as 2, 2 and 1 as against the marks for each question is 4, 4 and 8 and that he is entitled for awarding at least 2, 2 and 4 marks for Questions Nos.12, 18 and 20 and that he lost a total of 8 marks for the above three questions. It is further stated that in total in both the papers he lost 16 marks even though answers which are tallying with the prescribed Telugu Academy Text Book and that in view of the same, he could not get seats in any Engineering colleges like IIT, Bhubaneswar, NIITs and BITs, Pilani etc, since the Management of IIT, Bhubaneswar has prescribed Top 20 percentile cut-off marks as 920 out of 1000 for the students belonging to State of Andhra Pradesh and that due to wrong valuation by the valuators of the 2nd respondent Board, he lost the eligibility by 1 mark in IIT, Bhubaneswar. It is also stated that the petitioner approached the 2nd respondent Board and made written submissions on 24-05- 2014 and 29-05-2014 in respect of his grievance, but no orders are passed thereon. Aggrieved by the inaction of the respondents, the present writ petition is filed.
3. The 2nd respondent filed its counter admitting that the petitioner appeared for Intermediate Public Examination in March, 2014 and he applied for re-verification and the same was done by adopting the proper procedure. It is stated that during re- verification the petitioner got the benefit of 2 marks in Chemistry and 3 marks in English subject and no benefit in Mathematics paper II-A and accordingly, the total marks in Chemistry were revised from 32 to 34 and in English from 87 to 90 and a revised marks memo with a total of 919 marks out of 1000 was issued to the candidate. It is further stated that the answer script of Chemistry-II of the petitioner was thoroughly reverified by the Subject Experts Committee consisting 3 senior most Junior Lecturers and during re-verification it was found that for Question Nos.2, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 18 zero marks were awarded by the Examiner and after reverification by Subject Experts Committee Q.No.8 and 18 were awarded 01 and 02 respectively. It is further stated that as the petitioner has to attempt only 6 questions out of 8 under Section B, 1 mark which was already awarded by the examiner was treated as extra, thus, the candidate was given the benefit of 2 marks by increasing the overall marks in Chemistry paper II from 32 to 34 and that regarding answers for Q.Nos.2, 7, 9 and 10 as contended by the petitioner were not reverified as they were already awarded marks as per the scheme of valuation by the Examiner and the Board, as a policy does not entertain further valuation of such answers to enhance the marks. It is further stated that the answer script of Mathematics paper II-A of the petitioner was thoroughly reverified by the Subject Experts Committee and during re-verification it was found that only for Question No.23, zero marks were awarded by the Examiner and after re-verification by Subject Experts Committee same zero marks were awarded to Q.No.23 and answers for other questions which the petitioner had attempted were not re-verified as they were awarded marks by the examiner already and that the Board as a policy does not entertain further valuation of such answers to enhance the marks if marks are already awarded to a particular answer and that the Examiner has awarded 3 marks each for Q.No.20 and 21 and hence the answers of these questions were not reverified in the Board and the candidate was given no benefit of marks in Mathematics paper II-A and the 2nd respondent sought for dismissal of the writ petition.
4. Heard the learned counsel for both sides.
5. A reading of the writ affidavit goes to show that the award of marks to the petitioner is by evaluation of his answer scripts by the concerned teachers and this Court cannot evaluate the answers by comparing the same with the answers prescribed by the relevant Text Books. This is exclusively within the domain of the teachers who evaluate the answer scripts and this court cannot declare that the petitioner is entitled for grant of marks and this court cannot direct the valuators to award more marks. Since the petitioner had grievance about awarding of marks, he applied for re-verification of marks by paying necessary fees to the 2nd respondent in English, Chemistry and Mathematics subjects and the same was done and the petitioner was informed by memo dated 17-05-2014 and was got benefit of adding additional marks in Chemistry and English and was not given any benefit of adding additional marks in Mathematics Paper-II (A) and on the request of the petitioner, again his Chemistry Paper-II was re-verified by the second time by subject experts on 20-06-2014, but as the answers given are not correct as per the scheme of valuation, the candidate was not given any benefit and the same was informed to the petitioner when he approached the Board for his result. Again on the representation of the petitioner dated 03-07-2014, the Chemistry Paper-II was re-verified for the third time by another subject expert on 08-07-2014 and there was no further addition of marks for the Chemistry Paper-II. It is not the case of the petitioner that he is seeking revaluation of the answers and the respondent also categorically stated that no revaluation of answers is provided as per Regulations. This Court cannot also compare the answer sheets of the petitioner and award marks by exercising the jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India and since the answer sheets of the petitioner were already reverified, this Court is not inclined to direct further reverification of answer sheets for awarding more marks. It is unfortunate that the petitioner has lost admission in IIT by loss of "1" mark, but that cannot be a ground for directing the 2nd respondent for reverification of his answer sheets.
In view of my foregoing discussion, the writ petition is bereft of any merit and is liable to be dismissed.
Accordingly, the writ petition is dismissed. No costs. As a sequel thereto, miscellaneous petitions, if any, pending shall stand closed.
A. RAJASHEKER REDDY, J Date: 08-10-2014 Ksn