Jharkhand HC reserves order on plea against separate exams for NLSUI Bengaluru admissions

The Jharkhand High Court on Thursday reserved for tomorrow its order on a plea filed by five Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) aspirants to quash the decision to separately hold exams for admissions into the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), Bangalore.

A single-judge bench of Justice Rajesh Shankar will tomorrow pronounce its order on the preliminary issue of jurisdiction given the pan-India ramifications of the exam.

The High Court was hearing a petition filed by a group of five CLAT aspirants seeking to quash NLSIU, Bangalore's decision to separately hold examinations for admissions into its law courses.

Advocates Shubham Gautam and Baibhav Gahlaut, appearing for the petitioners, urged the court to set aside this decision and to grant ad-interim or ex-parte stay on the effect and operation of the notice during pendency of the present petition.

CLAT is a centralised common entrance text, which is held by a consortium of law universities, for admissions into undergraduate and postgraduate law courses in 22 varsities across the country, including NLSIU, Bengaluru.

However, NLSIU last week announced that it will hold a separate "online home-based" entrance test for admission into its five year BA LLB (Hons) course for the academic year 2020-21 and not accept the CLAT scores.

The varsity had said that its decision is to ensure timely admissions amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, due to which the CLAT exams have been delayed.

( With inputs from ANI )