UPSC Aspirants Who Missed Civil Services Mains Exam Due to Covid Approach Supreme Court For Extra Chance

A group of three civil services aspirants who cleared the UPSC 2021 prelims exam has moved Supreme Court (SC) seeking an extra attempt for the civil services mains exam. The aspirants claim that they could not appear in all papers of the main exam held last month after testing positive for COVID-19. They claim that the UPSC has no mechanism to allow Covid-19 positive aspirants to take the exam, so they had to leave their exam.

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The candidates want SC to intervene and allow them to sit for an extra attempt for the papers they have missed. In response to the petition, the Supreme Court on 28th February (Monday) directed the petitioners to serve an advance copy of the petition, in which they are seeking an extra attempt at Mains, to the UPSC. 

One of the three aspirants could not appear in any of the papers due to COVID-19 while the other two petitioners had to leave the main exam, held from January 7 to 16, in-between after appearing in some initial papers. The bench of Justices A M Khanwilkar and C T Ravikumar has asked senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, who was appearing for the petitioners, to serve the copy of the petition to the standing counsel for the concerned respondents and let the other side come and respond.

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The petition claimed that the absence of a policy or arrangements to accommodate COVID-19 positive candidates to appear in the civil service mains exam 2021 have violated their rights, including that of under Article 14 (equality before law) of the Constitution of India.