The Bombay High Court today directed Maharashtra State Education Board (MSEB) to reassess the answer papers of three candidates,who had appeared in a Common Entrance Test (CET) for a government job but were disqualified after they fell short by two marks. The three candidates had approached the High Court contesting the test held for the job of 'Shikshan Sevak' in government schools and contended that they were not given marks for answering five questions correctly. "According to the answer key to the CET,the longest river in India is Bramhaputra. This is in contradiction to the MSEB's own textbooks of ninth and tenth standards which says that Ganga is the longest river," the students' counsel Mukesh Vashi argued. After the results were out,the MSEB put up the answer key on its website. However,answers to five questions were incorrect,the petitioners claimed. A division bench of Justices P B Majmudar and Amjad Sayed today directed the MSEB to reassess the answer sheets of the three candidates - Pravin Khandagale,Nataji Gadekar and Rukmini Gadekar. "Keep them on your list and as and when a vacancy comes up in any school give the post to any of these three," Justice Majmudar directed. The direction was given after an affidavit was filed by Savita Phatale,evaluation officer of the board admitting that these questions were wrongly answered in the answer key. However,she had said not all the three petitioners had answered them correctly. According to the affidavit,marks of the trio cannot be increased as it would be unfair to the 54,695 selected candidates. The other questions which were allegedly wrongly answered by the board,were - the Marathi film which bagged the Sant Tukaram award for best film in 2010,the sport introduced for the first time in the Delhi Commonwealth Games,the element invented after the periodic table prepared by Dmitri Mendeleev,and the evaporation point of water.
