At least nine Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) 2015 candidates from Madhya Pradesh have been shunted downwards rather than upwards in their college preferences in the second round of allotments.

All students who were downgraded lost their first-round seat in NLIU Bhopal for a college lower down their preference list.

Some of the students were downgraded in the first round preferences from:

• NLIU Bhopal to RMLNLU Lucknow in 2nd round, without upgrade option now shown (Madhya Pradesh state domicile).
• NLIU Bhopal to HNLU Raipur in 2nd round, after NLIU seat was locked in first round.
• NLIU Bhopal to GNLU Gandhinagar (Madhya Pradesh state domicile)
• NLIU Bhopal, locked in 1st preference, to GNLU Gandhinagar in 2nd round (Madhya Pradesh domicile)
• NLIU Bhopal in first preference to NLU Cuttack in 2nd preference (Madhya Pradesh domicile)
• NLIU Bhopal, locked in 1st round, to HNLU in second.
• NLIU Bhopal under a reserved quota, locked, in 2nd round changed to NLU Tiruchipalli in unreserved category.
• NLIU Bhopal, in second round to GNLU Gandhinagar.
• NLIU Bhopal, locked, then in 2nd round to HNLU Raipur (Madhya Pradesh domicile).

At least one candidate received the following email from the CLAT authorities yesterday evening:

Dear Candidates,

In the first indicative allotment list due to some inadvertent error you had been allotted seat in NLIU, Bhopal. Subsequently the error was rectified and your locked choice had been changed. Consequent upon this you have been allotted the University of your next below choice as per the preference given by you. You can still opt for up-gradation from your present allotment or lock the seat allotted to you in the second allotment list by login in to your account. Please take note of the above information and act accordingly to complete further admission formalities.

Help Desk,

CLAT- 2015

CLAT convenor RMLNLU Lucknow’s joint registrar Dr JD Gangwar did not respond to messages seeking comment since yesterday.

One student said that he would not have entered into the counselling procedure and paid the Rs 50,000 fee, if he hadn’t been incorrectly told that he had achieved a seat in NLIU Bhopal in the first round.

He now claims that the full refund of Rs 50,000, and said that since the error was CLAT’s, it was unfair to pay for the Rs 10,000 deduction that was standard for withdrawals from the process.