New Delhi: The Delhi High Court has directed the Government and Railways timely reservation and subsidised tickets to students under Persons with Disability (PwD) category, from remote areas who are willing to come to Delhi and appear in the physical exams being conducted by the Delhi University.
A Division Bench of Justice Hima Kohli and Justice Subramonium Prasad has asked the Ministry of Human Resource Development and the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment to coordinate with the Ministry of Railways an facilitate the movement of these students. The Ministries have also been asked to submit separate affidavits on steps taken by them to ensure movement of these students from the PwD category, from remote areas like Bihar, UP and Chhattisgarh, to come to Delhi at least 5 days before the exams commence.
The court has directed NFB to provide a list with total number of PwD and VH category students from remote areas, who would be willing to come to Delhi to take the physical exams, to all the Ministries concerned.
The Court has also asked the Delhi University to state in its examination notification that the students from remote areas who fall under the PwD and VH categories and are willing to take physical exams in Delhi, should send their requests to the University by 4th September.
The directions have come in response to pleas filed by Prateek Sharma and National Federation of Blind, seeking assistance for PwD category students and those that fall under the Visually Handicapped (VH) category to be able to appear in final year DU exams.
During the hearing today, Senior Advocate SK Rungta, appearing on behalf of the National Federation of Blind, submitted before the court that around 222 students from VH category would opt for the physical mode of examinations and since most of these students are living in remote areas of Bihar, eastern UP and Chhattisgarh, they’ll have difficulty in getting finances to travel to Delhi.
Mr Rungta added its the State’s responsibility to give financial support to the extraordinary times to financially support PwD and VH category students specially in these extraordinary circumstances. He informed the Court that the National Federation of Blind will take care of their boarding expenses.
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However, Senior Advocate Saurav Datta, on behalf of DU submitted that the University has given the leftover students options to take the exam remotely and submit the answer sheets through email.
-India Legal Bureau