The recently indefinitely-delayed Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) has been re-scheduled to be held on Monday, 7 September 2020, according to several authoritative sources with knowledge of the development.
Update 21:25: According to a draft of the notification we have seen, which will be shared with candidates probably later this evening, in its meeting today the CLAT consortium’s “General Body assessed the prevailing lockdown situation in various parts of the country and the health and safety protocols necessary for the conduct of this exam”, and had decided:
The CLAT 2020 examination for both UG and PG candidates will be held on 7th, September 2020 from 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM…
The Consortium is in the process of securing further permissions so that the Admit Cards of candidates shall be considered as Movement Passes by local authorities to allow candidates to move between Containment zones and travel to their designated examination centre.
Admit Cards of the candidates indicating the Roll number and Centre shall be available for download from the website (consortiumofnlus.ac.in) in 2 weeks’ time.
Update 21:42: The notification has been announced on the official CLAT social media channels now (see below for image).
We understand that a Monday 7 September date was picked for the exam (rather than a weekend, as is customary for CLAT) since several states, such as Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu have instituted lockdowns on weekends, which would put a spanner in the works of an exam physically held at test centres, such as the CLAT.
Also, the main joint entrance examination (JEE) for IITs is scheduled to end on Sunday, 6 September.
A majority of the CLAT consortium of vice-chancellors (VCs) had agreed and voted in favour of the new date this evening, following their decision last week to postpone the exam from 22 August, as we had first revealed on 5 August.
As we had reported back then, an early draft of the notification had included language that the new CLAT date would be announced with a minimum of 21 days’ notice and in any case before 1 September.
The later notification did not include any such timelines, which makes sense in light of today’s speedy decision to announce a new date.
The main reasons for the postponement from August had been that several states had announced full lockdowns for the entire month, while the Ministry of Home Affairs had ordered a ban on mass academic congregations that month.
Due to being a physical exam held via computers at test centres, the CLAT had also announced detailed health and safety measures to minimise the spread of Covid-19.
Those same measures will also apply for the September date, according to the new notification.
Photo by Michael Surran
