Varsity's fine arts students cannot get practical exams re-evaluated

Mumbai University and the Students Grievances Redressal Committee (SGRC) are at loggerheads over lack of clarity in the Bachelor of Fine Arts practical exam reassessment. While the SGRC claims that the university deliberately doesn't want to reassess their practical exam papers, the university says it simply does not have a provision for reassessing practical exams.

In the 2016-17 academic year, second year students of the BFA course, who had failed in the final practical exam, approached SGRC for reassessment. "Every year, a number of students from the BFA, Architecture and other courses fail because of low marks in their practical exams. In these courses, the practical exam paper carries higher scores, if the students keep losing an entire year because of some stringent norms of the university, which is not suitable for all courses, it is the duty of the university to change the norms," said Jagtap Mahadeo, member, SGRC.

Meanwhile, second year students from the BFA course have started appearing for all papers of the second year on Wednesday. Students said on March 14, they met Education Minister Vinod Tawde where he promised to intervene, but nothing has happened yet.

University registrar Dr MA Khan said, "As per the University norms practical examination papers cannot be rech­ecked unless there are cases of the college deliberately failing students. And, only the varsity Board of Directors can decide whether papers will be checked or not."