October 10, 2023 — In the Gujarat High Court, in the case, R.Shri Vignesh vs The Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad IIMA, a student of the Institute filed an application seeking the quashing of the order for cancellation of his admission to a two-year postgraduate management program to the IIMA. Even as Vignesh passed four trimesters, his admission was terminated in September 2023 when the institution sought degree documents. The court called IIMA and IIT-M to file their responses by October 21.
Vignesh joined IIMA's May 2022 batch after scoring 98.66 percentile in the CAT. Despite completing his BTech + MTech at IIT-Madras in June 2021, delays in obtaining his degree certificates prevented him from submitting them to IIMA, leading to his admission being canceled in September 2023.
Still, IIMA gave him several extensions, and finally, Vignesh's admission was dismissed in September 2023 when he passed four trimesters of the program. He had passed all four trimesters successfully but failed in converting his degree certificate, which IIMA deemed appropriate to disqualify him.
In the petition, Vignesh alleged that the delays were unwarranted and had happened due to procedural complications in IIT-Madras. Finally, he got his degree documents in July 2024 and immediately applied for re-admission into IIMA, but the Institute rejected his application.
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Even though Vignesh's lawyer called for the performance cancellation, he stressed that the cancellation was unfair because Vignesh had sought the relevant documents in good faith and with persistence. It also strongly mentioned that the technical reasons IIMA made for not allowing Vignesh to complete the program affected his educational career after finishing most of it.
According to Vignesh's legal representation, IIMA had sought several postponements in the past, which resulted in the student not worrying that the delay would cost him his slot. Among other things, they said that the sudden cancellation went against the principles of natural justice.
Justice Aniruddha P Maye passed the order, gave stakeholders IIMA and IIT-Madras a stay of one and a half months, and asked them to reply on or before 21 October. Vignesh also prayed to the court to get clarification from IIT-Madras concerning why it took the institution so long to release the degree certificates that led to the occurrence.
This case aims to demonstrate how students struggle when cases of bureaucratic delay come into play. This brings to justice the significance of cooperation between institutions, focusing on the fact that students should not be punished for issues beyond their control, such as delayed administration. IIMA maintains a lot of rigidity in academic regulations, and IIT-Madras, a premier technical university across India, is on the star-studded list of accused.
What has happened in this case may influence the court's decision, which may affect many students in the future.