Indian university faces court notice for failing law student over alleged AI use in assignment

Chandigarh: The Punjab and Haryana High Court issued a notice to the O P Jindal University on a plea filed by an LLM student against a university committee decision that he used AI in an exam submission.

Justice Jasgurpreet Singh issued the notice and sought the response of the Jindal Global Law School of the university on a plea by Kaustubh Shakkarwar, who sought to quash the university decision. The hearing has been posted on November 14.

The petitioner sought setting aside of the ruling of the university's controller of examination and the unfair means committee on the ground of breach of principles of natural justice against him for allegedly not hearing him and supplying documents.

LLM candidate Shakkarwar, is an engineer-turned-lawyer, who practices intellectual property laws before various fora and works as a junior standing counsel for the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs before the Delhi high court.

He contended that the university had not produced any evidence of use of the alleged "AI generated material" in the subject 'Law and Justice in the Globalising World' and failed him.

Shakkarwar had appeared for his first-term examinations on May 18 and submitted answers for the end-term for the subject but was accused of making an "88 percent AI-generated" submission on the subject and marked "fail" on June 11.

The petitioner claimed of being informed that the unfair means committee would hear his grievance and therefore he submitted a memo of arguments and requested the university to supply documents, never receiving it.

The petitioner further requested documentary evidence from the university asking the specific rule which prohibited the use of AI but did not get a response. In a communication from the committee, which graded him as failed, he was told to appeal before the examination appellate committee for which he would have to write to the controller of examination.

The petitioner claimed of lodging his protest – seeking details of the 'means, mode and method' of appeal hearing before the appellate committee – with the controller of examination, which reportedly dismissed his appeal after a delay of about four months without hearing him.

"Forced by the conduct of the university and having no other efficacious appellate remedy, the petitioner beseeches the quashing of the decision against him by the university," his plea read.

Shakkarwar also invoked the Copyright Act stating, "Section 2(d) (vi) of the Copyright Act, 1957, makes it amply clear that, arguendo (for the sake of argument), if the petitioner even did use AI, the copyright of the artistic work would lie with the petitioner, and thus the allegation of violation of copyright, fails.”