Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court has held that regulations cannot be introduced at the fag end of an examination process or just before or at the time of announcement of results.

The court passed the order while quashing the category-wise qualifying criteria for eligibility for lecturers’ posts for the UGC NET last year.

Justice Ashok B. Hinchigeri passed the order recently, while allowing two petitions challenging action by the University Grants Commiss­ion, which had changed the eligibility criteria for general category candidates at the time of announcing the results for exams held in June 2012.

A 36-year-old lecturer and an advocate, postgraduates in law from Mysore University, had appeared for the National Eligibility Test (NET) for the junior research fellowship and lecturer posts.

The eligibility criteria for the post of lectureship for the candidates from general category was initially set at 40% in paper-I, 40% in paper-II and 50% in paper-III. As per the notification issued by the UGC NET Bureau, both the petitioners had obtained the minimum qualifying percentage in all the three papers.

But the NET Bureau, at the time of announcing the results, raised the minimum qualifying percentage to aggregate 65 for the candidates from general category, prompting the two petitioners to approach the court.

The counsel for the petitioners submitted that the terms and conditions at the time of calling for the applications govern the entire process of the test, including the fixing of the minimum marks and the announcement of results.

 “Midway, the minimum qualifying percentage cannot be varied to the disadvantage of the candidates,” the advocate argued, placing before the court an order of the Kerala High Court quashing the upward revision of minimum qualifying percentage.

The court ordered: “The aggregate 65 as minimum qualifying percentage is quashed. It is declared that the petitioners have acquired the eligibility criteria for lectureship, if they have indeed secured 40 per cent in paper – I, 40 per cent in paper – II and 50 per cent in paper – III or more.” The court also directed the UGC to issue the eligibility certificate to the petitioners before August 16.