The Supreme Court dismissed the plea preferred by a student whose allotted admission seat in Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute, Mumbai was rejected on the ground that he failed to produce OTP to the institute in the stipulated time.
A two-judge bench led by Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice Surya Kant observed that it was very difficult for them to interfere in the matter as it all took place in December, 2021.
“There are so many other students, understand! You have missed the bus, you have missed the bus! The petitioner failed to upload OTP for confirmation of admission within the stipulated time. The admission has already been concluded. Hence, no case is made out,” observed the Court.
AOR Amit Pai, appearing on behalf of the petitioner, submitted that there was a sudden emergency in the family, therefore, the petitioner had to rush to Udaipur, so he deputed one representative. The OTP was sent to the candidate’s number, though it was immediately sent by the candidate, but it could not reach the representative because of the network.
Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute is a state-funded college located in Mumbai and one of the oldest engineering colleges in Asia.
The petitioner relied on the judgment in Prince Jaibir Singh v Union of India & Ors case, wherein the court allowed the appeal of the students, who were unable to process the online admission fees and thus, had missed securing allotted seats to the IIT Bombay.
It was further submitted that the petitioner was supposed to travel out of the city due to a medical emergency in the family and was supposed to return for the admission, but due to the outbreak of Omicron variant of the Covid-19, the petitioner couldn’t return to Mumbai and therefore on the designated day of the spot round, the petitioner sent a representative to the institute with a valid authorization letter and all the original documents along with the Demand Drafts for completing the admission process. Another step was to enter an OTP which would have completed the process, due to a network problem the OTP couldn’t arrive. Because of this, the admission of the petitioner got cancelled.
The petitioner immediately informed the representative but due to poor connection, the message couldn’t be delivered. The OTP was valid up to 6.27 pm and the petitioner and his representative established contact at 6.37 pm. The petitioner contended that the institute could have regenerated the OTP, instead of cancelling the admission straight away.
Case Name- Aaditya Santosh Shrivastava Vs The State of Maharashtra & Ors.