Bombay HC comes to rescue of dyslexic girl in HSC admission

In a relief to a dyslexic student who has scored over 80 per cent marks in ICSE exam, the Bombay High Court today directed the Maharashtra government to accept her online admission forms for Class XI in state Higher Secondary Board.
Ava Kaka's online forms were being rejected by the online submission system as she had not appeared for the mandatory six subjects in her Class X exam.
According to her lawyer Mihir Desai, the ICSE Board had exempted the 16-year-old candidate from appearing for Hindi paper, after considering her medical condition.
Dyslexia leads to difficulty in learning to read fluently and with inaccurate comprehension despite normal intelligence.

"In 2011, the petitioner had undergone a medical examination at Drishti Special Dyslexic Centre which recommended to the ICSE Board that Ava should be exempted from one language paper. The board accepted this recommendation and exempted the petitioner, so she appeared for only five subjects in the Class X exam in March," Desai argued.
Government pleader G W Mattos, however, said the exemption granted by ICSE was not binding on the state board.

"Out of over one lakh students who have filled online forms, 226 students are disabled, and two are dyslexic. These students have appeared for all the six subjects," Mattos argued.

Ava can instead go to colleges and submit the forms manually, he said.
The division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice M S Sanklecha, however, held that Ava cannot be deprived of the online submission facility just because she took the benefit of exemption.
The court directed the principal of Ava's school -- J B Petit High School -- to verify her online forms as required by the rules, and asked the state education board to accept them.