Justice M Dhandapani issued the direction following a writ petition by R Nithya who sought a direction to the university to approve her re-admission and allow her to write the semester examination in January.

Rejecting her case for continuance and write the examination was unsustainable, said the judge, directing the Controller of Examinations to admit and permit her to write the semester examinations within a week. “Further, the DTE is directed to approve the readmission of the petitioner in Jeppiar College of Engineering to continue her course,” said the judge.

He cited Regulation 5.1 of the university that says that a student should complete the course within 14 semesters or seven years from the time of joining, and pointed out that if Nithya is permitted to write the exam, she would only be in the ninth semester.

In her petition, Nithya said she had joined the college in 2016, but had to discontinue studies in 2018 after suffering from allergic right sinusitis /allergic rhinitis. After recovering, she rejoined the college in July. Though she paid the examination fee for the fifth semester scheduled for January 2022, she could not get her registration number from the university.