The Supreme Court of India on Thursday refused to make changes to term 1 board exams conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) and the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE). The Supreme Court Bench of Justice AM Khanwilkar and Justice CT Ravikumar disposed the petition requesting for hybrid mode of exams — online and offline. The Supreme Court however did give instructions that if there are any shortcomings in Covid measures during examinations then they should be immediately remedied by the authorities.
“Don’t mess up with the education system. Let the authorities do their job well. It is too late now. This last minute business should be discouraged”.
CBSE term 1 exams have already started and CISCE exams will begin next week.
It would be inappropriate to disturb the exams at this stage, the bench said, adding that the government has taken COVID precautionary measures to ensure safety of students.
“Exam centres increased from 6,500 to 15,000. Exam duration reduced from 3 hours to 1.5 hours…Hope and trust that authorities will take all care to ensure that students and staff are not exposed to untoward situations,” the bench said.
The petitioners had argued that offline exams put them at the risk of COVID-19 infection.
“Continuous exposure through offline exams sharply increases the risk of infection to COVID-19 rendering the impugned action as arbitrary and in violation of Right to Health,” they said in the petition.
Hybrid mode of examination is the need of the hour, as it better facilitates social distancing, reduced strain on logistical constraints, they said.
Senior Advocate Sanjay Hegde argued for the petitioners saying that there are students who have comorbidities. He added that the offline mode of exams poses health risk to the lakhs of parents too who will crowd outside the exam centres.
But the Supreme Court countered saying that the number of examination centres had been increased immensely to address that issue.
