Karnataka high court overturns order for third valuation of answer scripts

Bengaluru: The Karnataka high court set aside a single bench order that required a third valuation of answer scripts of certain MBBS students, providing relief to Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS).A division bench comprising Chief Justice Vibhu Bakhru and Justice CM Poonacha held that the ordinance or notification governing the central assessment programme (CAP) for theory paper assessment of all undergraduate health science courses of the university benefits students. CAP provides for two valuations and considers the higher marks awarded between the two.
On July 30,2025, a single bench issued two directions. Firstly, the RGUHS syndicate and academic council was directed to reconsider the matter afresh, specifically with regard to providing essential key answers or model answers for descriptive questions, in order to prevent anomalies or ambiguities during the initial evaluations. Secondly, RGUHS was told to forward the answer scripts of the petitioners to an additional evaluator for fresh assessment, in light of the significant discrepancy between the marks awarded by the evaluators. RGUHS challenged the order.The division bench noted that the National Medical Commission (NMC) seemed to have altered its stand and that subjective answers could not be evaluated on the basis of key phrases or terms used in the answers. RGUHS argued that answers to medical science questions were evaluated based on students' understanding and knowledge."In our view, it would not be appropriate for this court to examine how answers to questions in a particular subject are required to be evaluated. The university is at liberty to take an appropriate decision uninfluenced by the observations made in the impugned order," the bench said."We are unable to accept that referring the answer scripts to a third valuer would, in any manner, mitigate this element of subjectivity in the evaluation of answer scripts," the division bench observed."If the third evaluator awards higher marks – that is, higher than the marks awarded by the two evaluators – the question would arise as to which of the marks is required to be accepted. There is no provision to declare the results on the basis of the highest marks awarded by three evaluators. There is also no provision for averaging the marks awarded by evaluators for finalising the result. In this view, the direction to refer the answer scripts to the third evaluator is unsustainable," it observed while allowing the appeals filed by RGUHS.