Courts Can Interfere With Answer Key If Error Is Patent, Not Inferential: Delhi High Court Refers Four UGC-NET Questions To Experts
The Court declined to disturb six questions involving academic opinion but directed fresh expert consideration of four objectively verifiable questions and required a speaking order within three weeks after hearing the petitioners.
Justice Jasmeet Singh, Delhi High Court
The Delhi High Court has held that judicial restraint in answer-key disputes is not absolute and that interference is permissible where an answer is clearly and demonstrably wrong without inferential reasoning or rationalisation.
The High Court referred four disputed questions from the UGC-NET June 2026 examination to the respective subject experts for fresh determination.
The Court was hearing connected petitions under Article 226 of the Constitution challenging alleged discrepancies between the provisional and final answer keys published for the UGC-NET June 2026 examination. The challenges concerned questions from the Education, Urdu and Geography papers.
A Bench of Justice Jasmeet Singh, while referring to the decision of a Division Bench of the Delhi High Court in Nandita v. National Testing Agency & Ors (2024), observed: “The restraint laid down in Nandita (supra) is not an absolute bar. The same decision recognises that a key answer may be interfered with where it is clearly demonstrated to be wrong, that is, where no reasonable body of persons well versed in the subject would regard it as correct. That test is met where the error is apparent without any inferential process or rationalisation. The four questions fall within that narrow category.”
Advocate Sidhant Goel appeared for the petitioners. Standing Counsel Parmanand Gaur appeared for the University Grants Commission.
Background
The petitioners challenged multiple answers appearing in the provisional and final answer keys. Their contentions and the respondents’ replies were placed before the Court question by question, along with the opinions of subject experts.
The Court considered ten disputed questions. In relation to six of them, it found that the controversy involved academic opinion or inferential reasoning. The respondents had stated in their counter-affidavits that subject experts had examined those questions.
The Court found no patent error in those six questions. It therefore declined to sit in appeal over the experts or substitute its own view merely because the petitioners proposed a different answer.
Four other questions were found to stand on a different footing. According to the Court, each had only one correct answer that could be verified objectively from standard source texts and material available in the public domain. They did not involve competing academic opinions upon which experts could reasonably differ.
Court’s Observations
Expert Opinion Could Not Be Reassessed As An Appeal
The Court referred to Nandita v. National Testing Agency (2024), in which a Division Bench had explained the limited scope of judicial review in disputes concerning examination answers. That decision had applied Kanpur University v. Samir Gupta (1983), which required a key answer to be presumed correct unless it was clearly demonstrated to be wrong.
Applying that restraint to the six inferential questions, the Court held: “In exercise of its writ jurisdiction, this Court cannot sit in appeal over the view of the experts or substitute its own, and no interference is called for with these questions.”
The absence of a patent error and the prior examination by subject experts placed those questions outside the narrow scope of permissible interference.
The Division Bench ruling in Nandita had also held that the National Testing Agency’s consultation with subject experts after receiving objections did not deprive those experts of their neutrality or independence. The present Court applied that restraint to questions whose resolution continued to depend upon academic assessment.
Four Questions Were Objectively Verifiable
The Court distinguished the remaining four questions because their answers did not depend upon an academic preference or a chain of reasoning. Their correctness could be tested directly against publicly available material and standard texts.
The Court observed: “They are not matters of academic opinion or inferential in nature on which experts may reasonably differ. Each has only one correct answer, which can be verified objectively from material available in the public domain and from the standard source texts.”
It held that these questions satisfied the test recognised in Nandita because no reasonable body of persons well versed in the relevant subject would regard the impugned answer as correct.
Wrong Key Could Affect Ranking And Eligibility
The Court distinguished the four patent errors from an inconsequential irregularity. It noted that marks awarded through the answer key determined the candidates’ relative merit and whether they crossed the prescribed qualifying threshold.
The Court observed: “An error of this kind should not be suffered by the candidates. A wrong key in a competitive examination affects ranking and eligibility, since the marks awarded on the basis of the key determine a candidate’s merit position and whether the candidate crosses the qualifying cut-off, and even a single mark may decide whether a candidate is considered.”
It therefore held that the four questions required reconsideration, while maintaining that the task of determining their correct answers remained with the subject experts.
Court Would Not Correct The Key Itself
The Court recognised that an erroneous answer key in a competitive examination directly affected ranking and eligibility. Since marks determined a candidate’s merit position and ability to cross the qualifying cut-off, even one mark could determine whether the candidate was considered.
The Court nevertheless declined to select or prescribe the correct answers itself. It held: “However, this Court will neither substitute its own view nor fix the answer key itself.”
It stated that the proper course was to have the experts determine the matter afresh. The four disputed questions were therefore referred to the relevant subject experts instead of being answered judicially.
Conclusion
The High Court referred Question IDs 4818042982, 4818042962, 4818048438 and 481804978 to the respective subject experts for determination. It treated the petitions as representations and directed the expert committee to hear the petitioners and pass a speaking order within three weeks.
The challenges to the six questions involving academic opinion or inferential reasoning were not accepted. The petitions and all pending applications were disposed of.
Cause Title: Nasir Rasheed v. University Grants Commission and Connected Matters (Neutral Citation: 2026:DHC:10098)
Appearances
Petitioners: Sidhant Goel, Deepankar Mishra, Kratvi Kawdia and Manasvi Kaushik, Advocates; Nishant Nain, Charu Sharma, Chanderjeet Yadav, Vasu Kumar and Ria Gupta, Advocates
Respondents: Parmanand Gaur, Standing Counsel, with Vibhav Mishra and Megha Gaur, Advocates; Mr. Khanna, Counsel