State to hold final year exams after SC rejects promoting students without exams

Students disheartened after five months of flip flop on exams 

@hepzia

Mumbai:  The Maharashtra government announced that it would soon hold final year exams for the 8.5 lakh-odd students of various courses, after the Supreme Court (SC) shot down its idea of promoting students without exams citing Covid health scare. A decision on the nature of exams – physical, online, open book or any other way- will be taken after consultation with all stakeholders like vice chancellors of universities, administrators, legal teams and even students, state higher and technical education minister Uday Samant informed. Due to involvement of multiple issues at play like restrictions on transportation, red zones, containment zones, health concerns etc with Covid numbers still high in state, Samant said that the state would soon look at ways to conduct exams safely in the current scenario.   

The state has decided not to appeal against the Supreme Court decision on August 28 to not grant graduation certificates to students without conducting examinations. This is reversal of Maharashtra’s decision to promote final year students of various courses on the basis of their aggregate scores of their earlier Semesters, due to Covid scare in state.  Maharashtra has the highest number of Covid cases in the country.

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The SC has however, granted states the flexibility to conduct exams beyond the September 30 deadline set by the University Grants Commission (UGC) in case local conditions were not conducive for conducting exams. Samant assured that students would get sufficient time to prepare for exams to avoid mental stress. He stated that while students could be disheartened by the turn of events but stated that the Maharashtra government had sincerely fought for the interests of students and parent community. The Yuva Sena had moved the Supreme Court to challenge the UGC order insisting on exams.

Students were clearly upset by the turn of events. “We have been living with uncertainty of exams since the past five months now. Our exams were first postponed from March to June and thereafter cancelled and now I will have to get back to studies again. After exams were cancelled, I have taken up a job as a sales marketing technician. With these turn of events, now I will have to manage both study and work now,” says Felix Dias, a student of Bachelor of Science (IT). 

The Students Islamic Organisation of India (SIO) felt that exams at this juncture were unfair, inequitable and detrimental to the health and future career prospects of students. “The examination – whenever they are held – should be simplified with a wide variety of alternative models of evaluation, including open book tests and oral quizzes should be employed by colleges. The authorities should also consider shortening the next academic year by reducing the syllabus of all the courses. In order to ensure that the delay in examination doesn’t disturb the academic calendar,” Mohammed Salman, zonal president of Maharashtra South of SIO stated. 

Maharashtra Students Union (MASU) founder Siddharth Ingle questioned if the state, Center or the UGC would take responsibility in case students got infected by Covid during exams or for the unfortunate loss of life of theirs or their family members.  

Meanwhile, in another development, five states have filed a review petition in the Supreme Court to seek postponement of the NEET/ JEE (Mains) exams across the country. The states of Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Punjab, Jharkhand and West Bengal had earlier been goaded by the Congress party to put up a united fight against the entrance exams scheduled in September.