Why Bombay HC raised concerns over Maharashtra’s GR to promote failed students, sought universities’ justification

The benefit was also provided to those who have backlogs from second year to get provisional admission to the first semester of fourth year. Fourth-year students, who failed in subjects from third year and could not clear them, will also get admissions to the first semester of fifth year. The circular was issued by SPPU after protests by various students’ organisations seeking relief for thousands of students.

“Shocking SPPU circular”

On September 9, an HC bench led by Justice Ravindra V Ghuge refused to grant any relief or entertain the plea and indicated the petitioner student was not entitled to receive any benefit of the circular. While the student’s lawyer said his client was not pressing the petition, the court issued notice to SPPU seeking its response; it was “intrigued” by its circular, which was “not only surprising, but shocking”.

The court noted that in all universities, the principle of ‘Allowed To Keep Terms (ATKT)’ is applicable, through which students who are eligible for ATKT can be admitted to next year. Such students, as per the court, have to pass or clear all the subjects of first year, while appearing for second-year exams.

Therefore, the HC said it was “beyond logic and reason as to why a student who has failed in first year should be granted admission to third year’s first semester.” The bench observed that if such was the type of rule introduced by SPPU, which has the name of “great revered educationist Smt Savitribai Phule”, it “would not augur well for the academic excellence of students in this university”.

The court also asked the Vice-Chancellor of SPPU to respond on the basis of such a decision.

On September 22, SPPU submitted that the circular was issued with the sanction of the Academic Council. To counter this, the bench then referred to “strict” decision issued by Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University (BAMU) with “firmness”, which mandated that all students who desired admission to the next year, should pass 75% of the subjects of the current year.

“Prima facie, we find that the Pune University circular appears to be lowering the standards of education of a generation, which is techno-savvy, has sources of knowledge at its fingertips and has an advantage of technological advancement, when it comes to assimilating knowledge deliver better performance in exams,” the HC had noted.

The SPPU then argued that most of the non-agricultural universities in Maharashtra followed policy akin to circular introduced by Pune University.

GR and HC observation

To this, the state government’s lawyer said the GR of February 10, 2025 introduced the “carry on” principle and several universities relied on the GR to allow students to continue with next year’s curriculum and sometimes even to third-year curriculum, despite failing in the first year.

The Higher and Technical Education department had introduced the “carry on” facility for engineering students in academic year 2024-25. It clarified that such a decision was taken in exceptional circumstances for academic year 2024-25 and cannot be cited as precedent for subsequent years.

Court seeks justification from universities

The court directed all non-agricultural universities in Maharashtra, which are covered by the Maharashtra Public University Act, 2016, to file affidavits to justify their circulars and also asked the state government to file its affidavit. The court appointed amicus curiae in the matter to assist it on assessing the state GR and subsequent circulars issued by various universities.