The Supreme Court of India on Friday, August 22, 2025, stayed a Calcutta High Court order that had directed the West Bengal Joint Entrance Examinations Board (WBJEEB) to scrap its merit list and prepare a new one based on a pre-2010 list of Other Backward Classes (OBC) communities.

The ruling paves the way for the long-delayed release of the West Bengal Joint Entrance Examination (WBJEE) 2025 results, reported the Telegraph. 

Court proceedings and delay

A bench led by Chief Justice BR Gobind Singh passed the stay while hearing the West Bengal government’s plea against the earlier order of Justice Kaushik Chanda. 

The WBJEE results, originally scheduled for August 7, were withheld after the High Court directed the board to prepare the list using an older OBC classification of 66 communities and to maintain a 7 per cent OBC reservation. The court further barred admissions based on the updated OBC list introduced post-2010. 

The state government had approached a division bench of Justices Sujoy Pal and Smita Das De, but the bench refused to intervene, prompting the appeal to the Supreme Court.

Next steps

Meanwhile, on August 18, 2025, the WBJEEB had issued a circular asking Scheduled Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST), and OBC candidates to submit valid caste and community certificates between August 18 and August 21.

With the Supreme Court’s order, the board can now proceed with declaring the results using the existing merit list.

Legal experts note that while the larger issue of OBC classification is still pending, the results are expected to be published shortly.