Patna High Court on Wednesday gave relief to Patna Women's College (PWC) students who had been denied permission by the college authorities to fill examination forms for the graduate examination because of low attendance.

The college had denied 321 students permission to sit for the examination, saying they had less than 75 per cent attendance.

The exams were conducted in February.

A division bench of acting Chief Justice I.A. Ansari and Justice Anjana Mishra on Wednesday directed the Patna University vice-chancellor and Patna Women's College principal to condone 15 per cent attendance of those students, thereby letting those who had at least 60 per cent attendance to sit for the examination.

It even ordered for a separate examination to be conducted, within 15 days, for students who could not sit for the original one in February.

The high court bench also directed the Patna University vice-chancellor and Patna Women's College principal to file separate status reports before the court, within a week, stating whether or not examination for all such students had begun.

The judges also ordered that results of both examinations - one already conducted (in February) and the other yet to be conducted - should be published together.

The order was passed on a petition by the All India Students' Federation, which alleged that the students were targeted because they had earlier joined a protest against an incident in which a college teacher was charged with eve-teasing on the campus.

Reacting to the court's order, a third-year undergraduate student said on condition of anonymity: "I am very happy with the judgment as I can now write the exam. The last three months had proved to be a dreadful nightmare for us. I thought my three years in college had gone waste. "

Another third-year student whose attendance is less than 75 per cent said: "I had lost all hope and had decided to take admission into a distance education course next year. The judgment brought my classmates and me a lot of cheer. We went through a lot of trouble to get justice."

The court order said: "This writ petition has raised issues of considerable importance, which relate to the career and lives of students of the college concerned."

The bench was so serious of the matter that it had even appointed Jitendra Kumar Singh, senior counsel of the high court, as amicus curiae to assist the court.

ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY FARYAL RUMI