38 students, 1 wrong code: Kerala High Court saves Class 10 CBSE Board exam candidates from ‘clerical’ nightmare

Court recognises students’ plight

• Compelling the students to undergo an examination against their will and choice would not be justifiable.
• The court noted that the students had undergone studies specifically in Communicative Sanskrit and had been preparing for that subject throughout the academic year.
• Obviously, the students have been expecting and preparing in advance for writing the subject Communicative Sanskrit.
• Even if the two subjects were similar in nature, the court held that forcing students to write a paper different from the one they had opted for and studied would cause serious prejudice.

• The court acknowledged that examination timelines are fixed for valid administrative reasons, including printing of question papers and logistical arrangements.
• It observed that ordinarily, such timelines cannot be interfered with lightly.
• “Such timelines are prescribed with a purpose,” the court noted.
• However, it found that the present case presented an “extraordinary situation” where judicial intervention was necessary to prevent injustice.
• The court held that failure to exercise its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution would result in “serious prejudice to the 38 innocent students”.

Directions issued, with warning

• Allowing the writ petition, the court directed the CBSE authorities, including the controller of examinations and the regional officer, to correct the subject code from “122” to “119” and permit the 38 students listed in the petition to write the ‘Communicative Sanskrit’ examination for the 2025–26 academic year.
• At the same time, the court was careful to clarify that its order should not be treated as a precedent.
• It emphasised that the relief was granted solely due to the extraordinary circumstances and the imminent prejudice faced by the students.
• Importantly, the judgment also left the door open for the CBSE to initiate appropriate action against the school authorities for the error committed.
• The Board was permitted to proceed in accordance with law and recover any costs incurred due to the correction process

How error occurred

• The case revolved around 38 out of 114 Class 10 students in the school who had opted for Communicative Sanskrit as their language subject.
• According to the CBSE regulations, the subject code for Communicative Sanskrit is “119”.
• However, while uploading the registration details on the CBSE portal, the school mistakenly entered the subject code as “122”.
• The discrepancy went unnoticed until January 12, 2026, barely weeks before the Board examinations scheduled for February.
• By that time, the CBSE’s correction window had long closed.
• According to the Board’s schedule, the last date for online submission of the list of candidates with normal fees was September 13, 2025, and the correction portal remained open from October 13 to October 27, 2025.
• When the mistake was discovered, the school immediately sent a request on January 12, 2026, seeking correction.
• The students themselves also submitted representations requesting urgent intervention. Subsequent communications followed on January 14, 23, 27 and 29.
• However, by communication dated January 23, 2026, the CBSE declined the request, stating that the correction timeline had expired on October 27, 2025, and could not be reopened.
• The Board also maintained that the students could appear for “Sanskrit” under code 122, contending that the subjects were similar and comparable.

Relief just in time

• With the Class 10 Board examinations around the corner, the ruling has brought immense relief not only to the 38 affected students but also to their anxious families.
• For teenagers who had spent months preparing for a specific syllabus, the prospect of writing a different examination paper, even if closely related, could have caused academic confusion and psychological stress at a crucial stage.
• The high court’s intervention underscores a broader principle: while procedural discipline in public examinations is essential, administrative rigidity cannot override fairness, especially when the students themselves are blameless.
• In balancing institutional timelines with individual justice, the court has reaffirmed that education systems exist to serve students, and not the other way around.

Delhi High Court intervention

• On February 19, the Delhi High Court dismissed the CBSE’s plea against the single judge order that permitted private candidates to appear for ‘additional subject’ examinations for the 2025-2026 academic session.
• While dealing with a CBSE’s plea against the single judge order, the division bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Tejas Karia said that the CBSE’s action “jeopardised” students’ educational career.

• “By its action impugned in the proceedings of the plea before the single judge, CBSE sought to defeat the valuable rights of the students, causing not only serious prejudice to them, but also jeopardising their educational career,” the Delhi High Court said.
• Highlighting that the CBSE’s action suffers from grave “arbitrariness”, the Delhi High Court order added that the board’s attempt to abruptly discontinue the category is “absolutely arbitrary and unreasonable”, that bringing the preparation of two years or one year of the students to nought.

‘CBSE to fix errors’

On February 3, the Delhi High Court issued a mandamus directing the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) to rectify clerical errors in the subject registration of three Class 12 students.

Justice Jasmeet Singh was hearing a plea of students of Class 11 and Class 12 seeking direction to CBSE to issue the admit card after correcting their registered subjects to allow them to appear in the CBSE Class 12 Examination.

While rejecting the board’s objection on February 3, the Delhi High Court said, “the academic careers of the petitioners are at stake, and the petitioners, for no fault of theirs, have been shown as students of the wrong subjects.”