NEW DELHI: A candidate who appeared for the Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) PG has approached the Delhi High Court challenging the high counselling fees levied by the Consortium of National Law Universities, calling them arbitrary and unaffordable for many aspirants.
The petition, filed by Jatin Shrivastava, who secured the 474th rank in the entrance exam, argues that the mandatory counselling fee of Rs 30,000, along with additional charges for freezing or confirming seats, is unjust and disproportionate. The matter was mentioned on Friday before the vacation bench of Justices Prathiba M Singh and Rajneesh Kumar Gupta, who have listed it for hearing on June 23.
According to Shrivastava’s plea, the Consortium demands Rs 20,000 as confirmation fees for every round of counselling, which must be paid afresh each time a candidate chooses to freeze their allotted seat. The petition contends this practice lacks justification, particularly as the financial capacity of students is not assessed before levying such charges.
“That Clause 2 - ‘Admissions Counselling process’, vide Clause 2.1 titled as ‘freeze option’ of which, whenever any candidate participant intends to apply for ‘freeze option’, he is required to deposit a ‘non-refundable confirmation fees’ of Rs 20,000/- at the time of opting for freezing of any seat,” the plea read.
It further said that this fee is payable at every round whenever the candidate opts to freeze any seat and thus may be charged even multiply in 2nd and 3rd round of counselling (considering there are only 3 rounds of counselling) whenever the concerned candidate participant intends to freeze the seat for himself of his choice.
“Thus, vide various Sub-Clauses of Clause 2.1, for the 2nd and 3rd/ final round of counselling, the candidate participant would be required to pay a non-refundable amount of Rs 20,000 - 40,000 only for freezing their seat in both the rounds,” the plea added.
Shrivastava argues that such a steep fee has “absolutely no nexus” with the counselling’s stated purpose and creates a financial barrier for many students. He further submits that the charges are not only excessive but discriminatory towards aspirants who lack the means to afford multiple rounds of non-refundable payments.
The petition urges the court to examine whether such a fee structure is legally tenable, especially in the absence of any criteria to evaluate a candidate’s ability to pay.
The issue is not isolated to Delhi, as a similar petition is currently pending before the Kerala High Court, where the matter is scheduled to be heard on July 22.