SC dismisses another plea for CBI probe into CBSE paper leak case

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed a plea seeking a CBI probe into the CBSE paper leak case and the Board's order to conduct re-examination.

The petition alleged that the CBSE gave the order to protect the "real culprits" within the body and demanded that it be quashed, but a bench of justices SA Bobde and L Nageswara Rao said that the court

would not like to the interfere with the conduct of the re-examination.

"We cannot interfere with the decision of CBSE. On this very ground this petition stands dismissed," the bench said, noting the top court had earlier dismissed similar prayers.

The counsel appearing for petitioner social activist Sanjoy Sachdev said that the CBSE is not a statutory authority and it had no authority to conduct the re-examination.

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) had on April 25 conducted the re-examination of the economics paper of class 12 across the country in wake of question paper leak.

The plea filed by Sachdev also sought that the results of the students who have already appeared in the test "in good faith and trust" be declared.

The petition sought to strike down the Central Board of Secondary Education's (CBSE) order to conduct the re-examination of the class 12 economics paper which was allegedly leaked last month.

"Order an enquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigations to take charge of all the cases of leakage from police of various states in order to the fix the criminal liability of the respondent no.1 to 4 (Centre, CBSE, Controller of examination of the Board and the Director of CBSE) and nexus involved," the plea said.

"This order (re-examination order) appears to have been issued in order to save the skin of real culprits within the central board of secondary education or their subordinates or affiliates," the plea added.

The petition said that the re-examination order was bad in law and against the principles of law of natural justice as it was taken without the students being heard.

It said the order penalises the the innocent and harmless students without a fault of theirs.

"No authority or the respondents ever gave any chance of hearing in the matter to lakhs of students from all over India," the plea said.