The aspirants of the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) did not get relief from the Patna High Court, which rejected the petitions demanding re-examination of the preliminary test (PT) and directed the commission to go ahead with the Mains examination.
“The Commission shall carry out the Mains Examination, ensuring that the process is peaceful, fair and transparent. The Commission shall also consider the suggestions given by us for firming up structurally to deal with such situations,” said the bench of acting Chief Justice Ashutosh Kumar and Justice Partha Sarthy, while rejecting the petition demanding re-test and saying that “no material or ground was suggested to direct for any CBI enquiry in the matter”.
RSKMP MP board 5th, 8th results 2025 announced at rskmp.in
“The court has also underlined the need to strengthen the system by the BPSC through certain measures to prevent such situation in future,” said Advocate General PK Shahi.
The court directed the BPSC to constitute a high level committee on a permanent basis of experts who would ensure a review of the security measures and over-all management of the examination.
Senior Advocate YV Giri, counsel for the students, said that in its voluminous order, the bench has given certain guidelines for future, but rejected the demand for re-test on the ground that it would affect a larger number of students and there was very little left.
“The Commission must make structural changes for addressing the vulnerabilities in the process of examination. The SOP requires to be stepped up. A dedicated wing should be created to register complaints during the examination process at all stages. Higher technology of digital water-marking and tracking be adopted,” the bench observed.
Maintaining that the evidence offered by the petitioners for mass-scale malpractice and paper leak are only Facebook and ‘X’ (Twitter) posts, post the examination, the bench observed that the success rate at different centres and in the re-examination “is not so stark as to definitely conclude that there were systemic flaws”.
“There appears to have been lapses but those are not of the kind and magnitude which would discredit the purity and fairness of the examination,” it added.
The bench also said that the Economic Offence Unit (EOU) of the State getting on alert mode before the examination is no proof to conclude that question paper had leaked before the examination had started and the evidence offered of some candidates having got special treatment at the State expense, even if accepted to be true, would be no proof of paper leak or cheating on a mass scale.
“There is no definite evidence of malpractice at all the centres on December 13, 2024. There is proof of disturbance at Bapu Centre at Patna a re-examination for that centre was held on January 4, 2025. The decision of the Commission cannot be faulted, as the law on the subject is clear that if it is possible to segregate tainted candidates from untainted, it must be done rather than cancelling the whole examination,” the bench said.
The court also terms “neither appropriate nor appreciable” the move of the Commission to call a meeting of the owners/teachers of coaching centres for facilitating communication with students on whom they have good control as also for the purposes of eliciting suggestions for peaceful, effective and fair conduct of examination and said that the students, instead of being counselled, were provoked. It said that the coaching centre owners ought to be more responsible in their conduct.
Some of the agitating students, however, felt let down by the court order and said that they would approach the Supreme Court against it.
The HC had on January 16 heard petitions demanding re-test in view of alleged irregularities filed by students backed by Jan Suraj Party of Prashant Kishor for around 80 minutes and refused to stay the result, but made it clear in the order that “any result of the preliminary examination, conducted by the Commission, will be the subject matter of the final outcome of this petition”.
On January 23, BPSC released the PT results. Out of 328990 candidates who took the test, 21581 clearing the preliminary test. The re-exam was conducted on January 4 for just one centre in Patna, the Bapu Exam Centre, where it was cancelled due to delay, lapses and students’ unrest on December 13.
Unaffected by continuing protests, flying allegations on social media and Opposition parties’ support to the students, the BPSC also announce the dates for the Mains exam from April 25-30, except April 27, at Patna centres, along with the HC rider, even as the hearing in the case continued.
BPSC all along stuck to its stand that there would be no re-test of the 70th combined competitive examination for all the students, while the government never showed any inclination to intervene, even as the students and their representatives remained firm on re-test citing gross irregularities.
Leave a Reply