An IIT aspirant who secured 270 rank has lost his seat due to a wrong click to withdraw his seat. The IIT said that their ‘hand tied by rules of business’ which is handled by the Joint Seat Allocation Authority(JoSSA).
The Young boy, Siddhant Batra from Agra, lost his mother two years ago. He was then taken care by his grandparents and his maternal uncle and also receives ‘orphan pension’. He got selected in the first round held on October 18. On October 31, he came across a link to ‘withdraw from seat allocation and further rounds’, while he was looking for the updates.
“He clicked on it under what he said was a ‘bona fide belief’ that he was not required for further admission rounds’, TOI published.
He thought that by clicking on the ‘freeze’ option, he will complete the admission process by acknowledging that he was satisfied with his seat.
He then moved to Bombay High Court against the withdrawal of his application. On November 19, The vacation bench directed the IIT to take the decision expeditiously.
“We direct the Respondents to treat this Petition as a representation of the Petitioner and take a final decision on the same as expeditiously as possible however on or before 21/11/2020”, in the order.
IIT registrar R Premkumar said that the “the institute has ‘no authority to quash the withdrawal letter’. Its hands were tied by the ‘rules of business’ under which the admissions are conducted”, TOI published.
Premkumar said that, all admissions are conducted by JoSSA and strictly followed. IIT-B said that, they have no seat vacant and Batra could apply again next year for JEE (Advanced).
“The withdraw option was a ‘conscious’ two-step process in the rules, said the IIT order. It allowed successful candidates to withdraw before the final round with no option to withdraw after the last round. ‘Seat acceptance fee’ gets refunded after a deduction of Rs 2,000.”, TOI published.
Siddhant Batra has moved to the Supreme Court which is tentatively scheduled to hear on December 4 (Friday).