MHT CET 2026: Bombay High Court upholds BTech admission cancellation over altered CET scorecard

The Bombay High Court has upheld the decision of the Maharashtra State Common Entrance Test (CET) Cell to cancel the admission to the first-year BTech renewable energy course at a private university in Pune over an altered CET scorecard. The student had claimed in his petition that he had downloaded the scorecard directly from the official CET website, and it already included the discrepancies.

The private institution found the MHT CET 2026 scorecard suspicious and cancelled the student's admission.

Later, the Maharashtra Cell also submitted the original records of both MHT CET exam results 2026 to the High Court, revealing that the student had indeed altered the scorecard submitted to the university and the court.

Justices Farhan P Dubash and R I Chagla upheld the cancellation of the admission and dismissed the student's petition, thereby nullifying the admission he had secured.

BTech admission based on tampered marksheet

The petitioner student had secured provisional admission to the first year of the BTech renewable energy course for the academic year 2026-2030 at a private university in Pune on June 23, 2026, based on a tampered CET marksheet.

However, discrepancies were found in the CET marksheet submitted during the admission process, and consequently, he was informed on July 10 that his provisional admission would be cancelled, and the cancellation was formally executed via an email sent on July 14.

In response, the student filed this writ petition on July 17, seeking relief from the Court.

While taking cognizance of the discrepancies between the two sets of marksheets, the Court directed the State CET Cell to conduct an inquiry. Accordingly, the State CET Cell submitted a supplementary report to the Court on August 4.

Based on the data regarding marks and percentiles available with the CET Cell and noting that the marksheets submitted by the student had not been generated by the Cell but were instead tampered with or forged, the Court drew its conclusions.

A review of the supplementary revealed that the total percentile secured by the student was 7.8474707 in the MHT CET 2026 first attempt and 13.5482364 in the second attempt; the figures were not 78.874707 and 73.5482364, respectively.

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BTech Admission: Court's observation

While delivering the verdict, the Bombay HC said that an exam is held to determine merit and offer educational opportunities, based on the integrity and authenticity of documents submitted by the students.

Court further observed and said: “Any attempt to tamper with marks, percentiles, or scorecards strikes at the very foundation of that process. It is particularly unfortunate when such conduct occurs in the context of admissions to professional courses, where merit is expected to be the sole basis for securing an educational opportunity."

The Court further observed, “Competition for admission to professional courses can undoubtedly be intense. A student's anxiety regarding securing admission and the disappointment arising from low marks or a low percentile are understandable. However, resorting to improper or unauthorized means to circumvent or alter examination results can never be condoned. No matter how desirable the admission may be, the act of tampering with examination records cannot be justified.”

The bench further said that if such actions are not curbed in time, the consequences extend beyond a mere illegal act by a single individual. These acts constitute an injustice to every student who took the exam honestly and competed based on their performance.

Consequently, the Court found no grounds to question the findings of the State CET Cell. The scorecard on which the petitioner relied to demonstrate a high percentile and secure admission was found to have been altered. Having reached this conclusion, the Bombay HC dismissed the petition.