Justice, at last!

Update (29 June 2005, evening): Looks like the last word is yet to be spoken; Badri reports that the Tamil Nadu government has decided to appeal the verdict in the Supreme Court. I hope the appeal fails.

Update

29 June 2005 : Hindu has an editorial strongly supporting the Chennai High Court verdict, and calling for a countrywide skills and aptitude test. The latter is something that the Hindu's editor N. Ram had talked about earlier.

Our earlier posts on this issue: 1, 2, 3.

For a more general discussion of national level entrance exams, see this post by Badri, and this one by me.

Today's Hindu reported:

The Madras High Court on Monday struck down the Government Order abolishing the common entrance examination for professional course admissions in the State, holding that this was not the correct or valid method to give redress to rural students.

The First Bench, comprising Chief Justice Markandey Katju and Justice F.M. Ibrahim Kalifulla, however, declined to interfere with the improvement examination scheme and said it was only a concession extended by the Government for students to improve their marks.

For the current academic year, the Government shall take into account the aggregate of marks obtained in the CET and the improvement examination as these examinations had already been held. "It would not be proper to cancel the improvement examination this year. But, for the academic year 2006-07 and onwards the improvement test need not be held by the authorities, unless they choose to restore it."