IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH CWP No. 4402 of 2009 Date of Decision: 20.03.2009 Baldev Singh ..Petitioner versus State of Punjab and others ..Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE T.S.THAKUR,CHIEF JUSTICE HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE HEMANT GUPTA 1.Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? 2. Whether to be referred to the Reporters or not ? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest? Present : Mr. Shakun Chaudhary, Advocate for the petitioner ***** T.S.Thakur, C.J. (Oral) In this petition filed in public interest, the petitioner prays for a mandamus directing the respondents to award to the petitioner and all other students, who have appeared in 12th standard Chemistry examination held on 05.03.2009 by the Punjab School Education Board, grace marks to enable them to pass the said examination instead of holding a fresh examination for the said subject as proposed. Appearing for the petitioner, Mr. Shakun Chaudhary argued that the petitioner is the father of a candidate and not a candidate himself and that in para No. 9(i) the prayer for awarding of marks to the petitioner is a typographical mistake. Be that as it may, the only question that falls for our consideration is whether there is any public interest CWP No. 4402 of 2009 [2] involved in the proposed holding of fresh examination in Chemistry by the Board of School Education in view of the fact that earlier examination was found to be unsatisfactory on account of the question paper for the said subject being out of syllabus. Although there is nothing on the record before us to suggest that a fresh examination is being proposed by the Board except a news item appearing in a vernacular newspaper 'Jagbani', yet assuming that the report is factually correct, the fact that the earlier examination was vitiated on account of the question paper in Chemistry being out of syllabus, was sufficient in our opinion for the Board to direct holding for a fresh examination. There is in any case no public interest involved in the matter nor any juristic basis for us to direct award of grace marks or adoption of any other mechanism for declaring the students who appeared in the said examination to have passed. The decision to hold the fresh examination in Chemistry appears to be uniform and applicable to all the students who have been registered for the examination in question. There is no discrimination being meted out to any one to call for interference by this Court in exercise of our writ jurisdiction especially in public interest. There is no merit in this petition which fails and is hereby dismissed. No costs. (T.S.THAKUR) CHIEF JUSTICE (HEMANT GUPTA) JUDGE 20.03.2009 'ravinder'