2026 CLAT-UG | Allahabad High Court Restores Final Answer Key, Sets Aside Single Judge Direction To Revise Merit List

By doing so, a Division Bench of Justice Saumitra Dayal Singh and Justice Swarupama Chaturvedi, in effect, restored the final answer key released by the Consortium on December 16, 2025, after the expert committees reviewed the raised objections.

The bench thus ALLOWED the Consortium's appeal against the single judge order by observing that courts cannot act as appellate authorities over the decisions of subject experts in academic matters.

Briefly put, a writ petition filed by a CLAT-UG candidate before the single judge challenging the final answer key for Question Nos. 6, 9, and 13 of Set-C. On February 3, 2026, the Single Judge had partly allowed the petition.

The Single Judge had noted that for Question No. 9, the Subject Expert Committee recommended two correct options, but the Oversight Committee overruled this recommendation without assigning any reasons.

Consequently, the Single Judge directed the Consortium to treat both options 'B' and 'D' as correct for Question No. 9 and publish a revised merit list for subsequent counselling rounds.

More about single judge's order here: 2026 CLAT-UG | One Question, Two Correct Answers: Why Allahabad High Court Ordered Revision Of Merit List For Future Counselling?

Aggrieved by this, the Consortium moved a special appeal before the division bench to restore its final evaluation and set aside the Single Judge's direction. The original petitioner also filed a connected appeal seeking further relief on the remaining disputed questions (Question Nos. 6 and 13 of Test Booklet-C).

High Court's order

Allowing the Consortium's appeal, the Division Bench today observed that the final answer key was the outcome of a structured and layered scrutiny mechanism involving a two-tier scrutiny mechanism involving subject experts and an Oversight Committee.

"Such an exercise by experts in the related field establishes a strong presumption of correctness, particularly in academic matters, unless a clear and demonstrable error is established", the Court opined.

The Court specifically noted that all three disputed questions originally objected to by the original petitioner [Questions Nos. 6, 9 and 13 of Set-C], the answers accepted as final were "a plausible and reasonable interpretation of the questions".

Crucially, while analysing Question No. 9, the sole question the Single Judge had interfered with, the Division Bench found that the Consortium's answer (Option 'D') was the only one "in consonance with settled principles of deductive reasoning".

It noted that it could not be demonstrated that the answers finalised by the Consortium suffered from any 'patent error' or that they were such that no reasonable expert could have arrived at them.

In its 19-page judgment, the Court stressed the limited scope of judicial review in academic matters. It noted that such interference could be justified only if the answer is shown to be demonstrably incorrect or wholly unreasonable, which was not the case in the present matter.

The Division Bench observed that courts cannot act as appellate authorities over the decisions of subject experts, as judicial review in such evaluation matters is available only under a "very narrow compass".

In this regard, the bench also relied upon the Supreme Court judgments in Ran Vijay Singh versus State of UP 2017 and Uttar Pradesh Public Service Commission versus Rahul Singh 2018, wherein it had been held that the courts should exercise restraint in matters involving evaluation of answer keys and should not act as appellate authorities over expert opinions.

"The settled position of law makes it clear that courts must refrain from substituting their own opinion in place of that of subject experts. Even where two views are possible, the view taken by the final academic authority must ordinarily prevail, provided it is a plausible view based on academic reasoning," the bench remarked.

In that view of the matter, the HC opined that the interference by the Single Judge, though well-intentioned, does not align with the settled parameters governing judicial review in academic matters.

Consequently, the Court allowed the Consortium's appeal and thus, set aside the single-judge order and also dismissed the candidate's connected appeal.

Counsel for Appellant(s) : Mr. Ashok Khare, Senior Advocate, Mr. Avneesh Tripathi, Mr. Nishant Mishra

Counsel for Respondent(s) : Mr. Nishant Mishra, Mr. Abhinav Gaur, Mr. Vibhu Rai, Mr. Ashok Khare, Senior Advocate, Mr. Avneesh Tripathi