The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to postpone the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering Exam (GATE), which is scheduled to be held on February 5, in view of Covid restrictions in many parts of the country.

A bench of Justices DY Chandrachud, Surya Kant and Vikram Nath said that postponing GATE just 48 hours before the scheduled examination would result in chaos and uncertainty, and it cannot play with the career of students, who have prepared for it.

The bench said that it is a matter of academic policy as to when the examination should be held and the court cannot enter this arena.

It noted that nine lakh students are to appear in the examination and around 20,000 students have signed an online petition for postponing the examination.

The students have prepared for it and the court cannot play with the career of the students by postponing the examination , the bench observed.

On Wednesday, the top court had agreed to list the plea seeking postponement of GATE.

The plea for postponement of the examination said that nine lakh students are appearing in the test at 200 centres and the authorities have not issued any Covid-appropriate guidelines for conducting the exam.

The GATE is an examination which tests the understanding of various undergraduate subjects in engineering and science for admission in masters programme and recruitment by some PSUs.