FINAL YEAR EXAM PETITION TO BE HEARD ON JULY 31

Yuva Sena says it is getting support from all quarters for its plea on the cancellation of examinations due to COVID-19 crisis

“Yuva Sena has written to and met colleges, institutes and universities and requested the “cancellation of examination, gym and hostel fees. - VARUN SARDESAI, YUVA SENA SECRETARY

The Supreme Court will hear, on July 31, the petition filed by the Tourism Minister Aaditya Thackeray-led Yuva Sena, challenging the University Grant Commission’s (UGC) revised guidelines to conduct final year examinations by September. Yuva Sena has opposed these guidelines citing the COVID-19 pandemic. Already the Maharashtra government has cancelled these examinations, expressing inability to mobilise the machinery because of the pandemic and also to protect the lives of all those who will be involved in the process.

Apart from Yuva Sena’s petition, the apex court will hear another petition by a group of 31 students against the UGC’s decision to conduct final year examinations compulsorily by September end.

Yuva Sena Secretary Varun Sardesai in a tweet said, “SC will have the next hearing on Friday regarding the PIL filed by Yuva Sena against the UGC guidelines. Yuva Sena has been garnering support from across the nation with students, teachers, education staff and associations sending in letters of support to us.’’ He further stated that not just students, but NSUI, Youth Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) Youth Congress have extended their support.

Sardesai took a swipe at Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), questioning what it has done apart from morphing faces and making memes. “Yuva Sena has written to and met colleges, institutes and universities and requested the cancellation of examination, gym and hostel fees. All this while we wrote and fought with UGC and even approached SC for exam relief,” he said.

Incidentally, Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray in his two-part interview to the Shiv Sena mouthpiece Saamna said that the Disaster Management Committee headed by him had reiterated its decision to cancel the final year examination because of the present COVID-19 crisis. He further informed that the students will be graded on the aggregate marks of their past semesters.

Minister of Higher and Technical Education Uday Samant recently urged the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and UGC not to make the final year examination an ego issue. Samant, in the recent interview with Free Press Journal, had said that Punjab, Haryana,Rajasthan, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Puducherry also decided not to conduct terminal examinations.