CLAT: 7 wrong model answers • Audit finds 0 tech issues • Next year complaints to cost Rs 1,000

Saturday, 03 October 2020 17:35 Pre-law student An estimated 8 minute read...

The Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) has released a statement following the expert committee’s review of objections received by candidates.

The review made conclusions on several different issues, communicated in a detailed two-page note, including:

• dropping 3 questions and changing the answer keys to another 4 questions in the undergraduate exam (one each in the English and Current Affairs sections and two in Quantitative Techniques); in the postgraduate test, 1 question was dropped.
• further to potentially hundreds of complaints that the system had not correctly recorded their answers, which we had reported on in-depth on Thursday, the review concluded that no further action would be taken as the software had functioned as intended.

The press release (see in full below) also noted that next year, to prevent “unnecessary objections”, it would charge Rs 1,000 per complaint (refundable if the complaint is upheld):

The Committee noted that a large number of unnecessary objections were filed because unlike NEET, JEE and NET etc. which charge Rs. 1,000/- per objection, CLAT-2020 had made filing of objections absolutely free and therefore the number of objections filed was so high. On Expert Committee’s recommendation, the Executive Committee and Governing Body of the Consortium have resolved that from next year a fee would be imposed for the filing of objections and if the objection is accepted, the fee paid should be refunded.

We have asked the CLAT for further details on such fee, for instance, whether the same fee would be payable by candidates without means. A member of the consortium replied: “Details of fee will be decided prior to notification of next year’s CLAT.”

Technical issues not confirmed

The consortium statement defended the technology of the exam, which was run on the TCS iON platform, by “the “most reputed service provider”.

TCS iON was being used by the JEE Mains, JEE Advanced, NEET (PG), GATE, Banking Services Examinations and Railway Recruitment Board Examinations.

The statement added that the service provider had been “using the same software for 11 years and it has always worked perfectly in terms of the answers chosen by the candidates and the response sheet generated by the system”.

We have asked the CLAT for clarification on when the TCS iON software was last updated, and what kind of changes may have been made in that update (the CLAT mock exams appeared to use version 17.05.21 of the software).

Regarding the “mark for review” functionality, which for some candidates behaved differently than they had expected (albeit the long pre-exam instructions explaining how it was to be used), the CLAT statement noted that it found the instructions were “clearly written” and that any questions “marked for review” would not be evaluated, according to the instructions.

Regarding the potentially more confusing instructions to change an answer to a question (see below), the CLAT explained that the instructions:

clearly said ‘To deselect your chosen answer, click on the button of the chosen option again or click the Clear Response button.’ The candidates thus had an option either to click on the initially chosen option and change their option OR click on ‘clear response’ and give fresh option. For both MARKED FOR REVIEW as well as CLEAR RESPONSE, Audit trail recorded same response and thus no candidate was disadvantaged in anyway.

We have asked the CLAT for further clarification on whether the system would also have accepted candidates’ having changed their answer by simply clicking on the new answer (or whether, as the instructions suggest, candidates must either, less intuitively (i) first deselect the original answer by clicking on it, or (ii) first click the ‘clear response button’).

3 Questions dropped

According to a notification on its website, three quantitative technique questions - 146, 147 and 150 (see below) - in the undergraduate exam were dropped.

We understand that the three questions that were dropped (see below), because they did not have any correct answers amongst the available options.

4 answers changed in answer key

A total of four questions in the undergraduate exam saw their answers changed, namely question 8, 35, 148 and 149.

Questions 148 and 149 are about the same semi-circle geometry problem in which 3 questions were dropped. For both the correct answer was changed from A to D (see below).

The correct answer in Question 8 from the English Section changes from D to A.

In the current affairs / general knowledge section, 35’s correct answer is now C, instead of D.

Full CLAT press release below

The Executive Committee of the Consortium of NLUs in its meeting dated September 16, 2020 had authorised Prof. Balraj Chauhan, Convenor, CLAT-2020 and Vice-Chancellor, DNLU, Jabalpur to constitute an Expert Committee for UG and PG to look into the objections and / or representations by the candidates in respect of CLAT-2020. The Expert Committee examined the objections received about the Examination (Technical Issues), Questions and the Answer Key.

The Committee noted that a large number of unnecessary objections were filed because unlike NEET, JEE and NET etc. which charge Rs. 1,000/- per objection, CLAT-2020 had made filing of objections absolutely free and therefore the number of objections filed was so high. On Expert Committee’s recommendation, the Executive Committee and Governing Body of the Consortium have resolved that from next year a fee would be imposed for the filing of objections and if the objection is accepted, the fee paid should be refunded.

The technical problems raised by the CLAT-2020 candidates were closely examined. Service Provider is using the same software for 11 years and it has always worked perfectly in terms of the answers chosen by the candidates and the response sheet generated by the system. The Committee also noted that TCS iON is the most reputed Service Provider. It has track record of successfully conducting various National Level Admission Tests and the Recruitment Tests such as JEE Mains, JEE Advanced, NEET (PG), GATE, Banking Services Examinations and Railway Recruitment Board Examinations etc.

The Expert Committee randomly examined the Audit Log of number of candidates who had raised objections to the response sheet, the Expert Committee did not find any discrepancy between the Clicks made by the candidate as recorded in the Audit Log and the Response Sheet. In fact, the Audit log showed that one candidate had changed the response as many six times and the system recorded the 6th and the final response. Thus the apprehension that earlier response was not changed has no basis.

The Committee said that since the Audit Trail of each candidate is the most authentic evidence of every click and mouse movement, in case of a dispute, Service Provider shall make available to the Court the Audit Trail of the concerned candidate. The Service Provider has been directed to keep the record of audit trail intact. In no other test, audit trail is either uploaded on the website or shared with the candidate.

The Expert Committee also noted that as many as five mock tests were conducted by the Consortium for UG and three for PG on the same platform on which CLAT was conducted on September 28, 2020 and in these mocks more than 50,000 candidates had appeared and therefore the candidates were expected to be familiar with the instructions and the platform of the CLAT. The Committee found the instructions in the mocks and CLAT were same except on the issue of calculator. The calculator was denied to the candidates in the CLAT 2020 because the calculator was provided in the mocks without the approval of CLAT Convener or the Executive Committee of the CLAT 2020. The candidates were duly informed about the non-availability of calculator prior to CLAT.

The Expert Committee also examined the objections regarding “MARK FOR REVIEW” but found no ambiguity between the instructions in the Mock Tests which were conducted to familiarize the student with the CLAT and the CLAT Instructions on this issue. Both the instructions were found to be exactly the same. It was clearly written in the instructions that “MARK FOR REVIEW” will not be considered for evaluation and hence no marks will be allocated towards the same. It may also be noted that the instructions were abundantly clear that “MARKED FOR REVIEW” will not be considered for evaluation and the candidates will not receive positive marks or negative marks for such questions. For every wrong answer 0.25 marks are deducted but for questions ‘MARKED FOR REVIEW’, no mark has been deducted.

Since instructions were same in both Mock Tests and CLAT-2020, the Expert Committee found no substance in the objections and recommended that “MARKED FOR REVIEW” questions cannot be considered as answers for evaluation. The Committee concluded that any change in the policy will adversely affect the Merit and Rank of candidates who have correctly followed the instructions. The Executive Committee and the Governing Body accepted this recommendation and resolved that the rules of the examination cannot be changed at this stage.

The Expert Committee also noted that the instructions were explicit on the point that only answers that have been clicked “SAVE AND NEXT” will be considered for evaluation.

Regarding the change of answer to a question that has already been answered BUT NOT MARKED FOR REVIEW, the candidate simply had to select the question and repeat the procedure for “answering the question”. [Read the Instructions, Point No. 8]. The Committee in particular noted instruction [8(b)] which clearly said ‘To deselect your chosen answer, click on the button of the chosen option again or click the Clear Response button.’ The candidates thus had an option either to click on the initially chosen option and change their option OR click on ‘clear response’ and give fresh option. For both MARKED FOR REVIEW as well as CLEAR RESPONSE, Audit trail recorded same response and thus no candidate was disadvantaged in anyway. The Executive Committee and the Governing Body thanked TCS iON for the excellent services rendered by them.

On the Expert Committee’s Recommendation, 03 questions of UG Examination and one question of PG Examinations have been dropped by the Consortium. In addition in UG Examination, keys of four answers are being changed i.e., one each in English and Current Affairs including GK and two in Quantitative Techniques. The Expert Committee did not recommend any change in Legal Reasoning and Logical Reasoning. Similarly, no change will be there in PG Examination key.

The Governing Body thanked Prof Balraj Chauhan, CLAT-2020 Convener for the successful conduct of CLAT-2020 and appreciated the assistance given by Prof P.S. Jaswal and Prof.Faizan Mustafa. Prof. Balraj Chauhan thanked Prof. Mustafa for not only fighting the legal battle of Consortium and discharging the duties of Secretary but also assisting him in the conduct of CLAT 2020.

Prof. Faizan Mustafa Vice-Chancellor,

NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad