Student, blocking IIT seat, not eligible to take JEE next year

Updated on: Friday, April 06, 2012

A student's failure to join IIT after clearing its entrance test and blocking a seat after duly paying the admission registration fee for it renders him ineligible to take another entrance test next year as such an act leads to a colossal wastage of the institutes's financial and other resources, the Delhi High Court has ruled.

Justice Hima Kohli gave the ruling, dismissing the plea of one Prateek Rohilla, who had blocked a five-year, M Tech course seat in Engineering Design (Automotive Engineering) at IIT Madras by duly paying the admission registration fees of Rs 20,000 after clearing the IIT's Joint Entrance Examination (IIT JEE) in 2011.

After blocking the seat, Rohilla never joined the Institute and wanted, instead, to take another IIT JEE in 2012 to better his result for a course of his choice.

He had come to the high court challenging the IIT-Delhi decision to debar him from taking that 2012 IIT JEE.

"Any course at Indian Institute of Technology is extremely prestigious and every seat is precious and cannot be permitted to be wasted in such a manner," said Justice Kohli, referring to Rohilla's failure to pursue course after blocking a seat.

In its ruling, the court concurred with the IIT counsel's argument that such acts of students "results in an immense financial strain upon the institute, which has to keep a seat vacant not just in the first year, but right through the course that may extend upto 5 years as in the present case."

Dismissing Rohilla's plea, the court also upheld the IIT admission regulations which stipulated in the information brochure for IIT-JEE, 2012 that candidates, who have taken admission or accepted the admission by paying registration fee at any of the IITs in 2011, are not eligible to appear in 2012 entrance examination.

Rohilla, who had cleared the IIT JEE 2011 as a scheduled caste student, had applied for the 2012 entrance test under the general category.

On March 17, the IIT-Delhi, which conducts the test, however, informed that his application for IIT-JEE-2012 stood cancelled as he was ineligible.

The court rejected Rohilla's argument that he should be allowed to appear for this year's entrance test as he had neither reported for joining, nor deposited the admission fee except depositing the registration fee which was refunded to him by the institute.

"No explanation, much less a plausible explanation has been offered by the petitioner (Rohilla) for failing to report to IIT (Madras) on July 26, 2011, in terms of the seat allotment to him.

The court took note of the fact that he failed to challenge the conditions in the information brochure and said, "Having failed to do so, he cannot be permitted to question the same, by trying to give it an interpretation which runs contrary to the clear terminology used in the relevant clauses."

"The court is also not oblivious of the fact that the IIT JEE 2012 is to be held on April 8, 2012 for which the application forms of the candidates were required to reach the Zonal IIT as long back as on December 15, 2011.

"It is therefore not acceptable for the petitioner to approach the court just about a week before the date fixed for the examination, when even as per his own case, he had submitted his application form on November 12 last year after reading the eligibility conditions laid down in the Brochure," the court said.

Student, blocking IIT seat, not eligible to take JEE next year

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