The bench, comprising Justice S B Mhase and Justice B B Vagyani, has also directed the state government to refund all fees collected from such students after the notification dated August 7, 1996, was issued.

The interim order specifies that students wishing to avail of the refund as a result of this order shall not be required to make any petition to the court. It has also asked the state government to issue necessary directions to all universities and dental/medical colleges in the state to comply with the court order.

The petitioners, Sandeep Sadashiv Pol and Sahebrao Deshmukh, both students of the MIMSR Medical College at Latur (a private institute), hadfailed the second year MBBS examination held in May 1997.

The two students submitted the required examination forms in order to reappear for the October-November examination, 1997. As required by the resolution, they were required to pay Rs 9,000 per attempt of appearances.

The petitioners, however, challenged the notification in the high court saying the college could not collect the amount from them as it had not rendered any service like library, laboratory or tuition fees to enable them to take the examination. The petitioners also contended that the powers to fix a fee structure rests with the respective universities and not the state government. Moreover, none of the universities in the state had prescribed any fee for repeater-failure students in medical and dental courses so far, they pointed out.

They said failing an examination is no offence and added that they are allowed as many as four attempts to pass the exam. They also submitted that they have been allowed to keep terms for the thirdyear MBBS course. Counsel for the petitioners, S B Talekar, argued that charging such fees is discriminatory and amounts to punishment.