Aaditya Thackeray moves Supreme Court against UGC's decision to conduct final year exams

New Delhi, July 18: Amid nationwide demand to scrap final year university exams due to the surge of coronavirus cases, the Yuva Sena, which is the youth wing of the Shiv Sena and led by Maharashtra cabinet minister Aaditya Thackeray on Saturday filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court, challenging the decision of the University Grants Commission (UGC) to conduct final year exams.

In its statement the Yuva Sena said the central government is ignoring physical and mental health, anxiety and safety of students across the country by allowing examinations to be held at the September.

"COVID-19 is a national disaster, in view of which the UGC should have cancelled final year exams... however, it seems the UGC has not understood the full extent of dilemma the country is facing," the Yuva Sena statement said.

The top court, however, is yet to accept the petition.
Notably, the UGC had on July 6 announced guidelines for colleges to conduct online/offline exams by September-end.

This was after all educational institutions countrywide were closed and ongoing exams postponed in view of the coronavirus pandemic and lockdown.

In a statement today, the UGC said that it had asked universities to inform it of about the status of conduct of their exams, adding that 755 universities had sent their response to it. Of these, it said, 194 universities informed that they had conducted their exams, while 366 said that they would do so in August/September.