Cuttack, Aug. 21: The legal battle over evaluation of answer scripts of Odisha Civil Service (Preliminary) Examination - 2011 in which faulty questions were detected in 18 of the 26 optional subjects, has been renewed in Orissa High Court today.

A petition seeking quashing of the preliminary examination conducted by the Odisha Public Service Commission (OPSC) was heard by the division bench of Chief Justice D. H. Waghela and Justice Biswanath Rath. The matter was posted for hearing on August 26.

Priyambada Das, 34, a resident of Rourkela, has renewed the legal battle by challenging the Odisha Administrative Tribunal's June 18 order.

The tribunal had quashed the evaluation process and directed OPSC to come up with a fresh merit list after revaluating answer sheets of 18 subjects by awarding full marks for the wrong questions only to those who had attempted them.

OPSC held the exam on January 19, 2014. Nearly 35,200 candidates took the test, but 5,823 candidates were declared qualified on May 2, 2014 to take the main examination.

In her petition, Priyambada, who has failed to clear the preliminary test, has alleged that the direction to give marks only to those candidates who have attempted the wrong question (having negative marking system for wrong answer) is "self-contradictory" and "illegal".

According to the petition, when a candidate sees a wrong question, he or she will either leave it or attempt it. Therefore, the order passed by the tribunal to award full marks to those who have attempted the wrong and faulty questions is inoperative.

Earlier, Priyambada had challenged in the tribunal the results of the preliminary examination, which OPSC had published on May 2, 2014 by giving grace marks to candidates in the questions of 18 optional subjects in which incorrect questions were detected.

Acting on it the tribunal had on August 26, 2014 quashed the results and directed OPSC to calculate marks of candidates by eliminating the faulty questions and negative marking and come up with results afresh.

But OPSC challenged the tribunal verdict on the ground that it was given by a single member bench. Subsequently, a two-member tribunal bench of acting chairman B. K. Dash and administrative member S. K. Dash gave the June 18 verdict.