New Delhi: India’s Ministry of Education and its minister Dharmendra Pradhan are facing the heat over not one, but two major controversies.
Following the NEET-UG paper leak, leading to the cancellation of the crucial exam for admission to undergraduate medical course, thousands of candidates who appeared in the CBSE class XII finals received unexpectedly low marks.
School Education and Literacy Secretary Sanjay Kumar said at a press conference that of the nearly 98 lakh answer sheets evaluated this year, around 13,000 were re-evaluated after some discrepancies were identified during the checking process.
These cases could not be fully handled through the On-Screen Marking (OSM) system and were manually reviewed before the marks were entered.
Amid rising concerns over accuracy in evaluation and outrage over the results, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has also revised its post-result review mechanism.
Students can now obtain scanned copies of evaluated answer sheets by paying Rs 100 and apply for verification or re-evaluation at Rs 25 per question, a reduced charge that will make the process less expensive for many families.
Education secretary defends process
School Education secretary Kumar, however, defended the board’s newly-introduced digital evaluation process and said there are safeguards to address genuine grievances.
He claimed that while the OSM-based assessment model was designed to improve transparency, consistency and speed in evaluation, the CBSE has established a correction mechanism to deal with cases where errors may occur.
“As you are aware, the Class XII resul
ts recently declared by the CBSE were marked using an On-Screen Marking system this time. Following this, certain concerns have been raised — specifically, students feel that the overall pass percentage has declined. Indeed, the pass percentage has dropped by 3 per cent compared to the previous year, falling from 88 per cent to 85 per cent. Some students feel that they should have received higher marks than those actually awarded to them,” Kumar said.
“I would like to emphasise that On-Screen Marking is neither a novel concept nor is this the first time it has been implemented. The CBSE first initiated the OSM system in 2014; however, at that time, due to technical infrastructure limitations, it was deemed unfeasible to continue the process immediately. We have successfully reintroduced it this year,” he said.
Rahul Gandhi and the Congress wasted no time in piling on the pressure on Narendra Modi government and Pradhan.
“Dharmendra Pradhan ji has not failed once. He has failed every single age group of India’s students at once. Every announcement plunges children deeper into uncertainty. Every failure goes unpunished. The Education Ministry has become a department of disasters,” the Leader of Opposition said on Sunday.
“Prime Minister Modi ji – can you at least apologise to the lakhs of children whose futures you and your Minister have destroyed?”
Asking why the Prime Minister is silent on the issue, Rahul reiterated his call for the sacking of the Education minister.
“NEET 2024: Paper leaked. Exam not cancelled. Minister did not resign. CBI set up an investigation. A committee was formed. NEET 2026: Paper leaked. Exam cancelled. Minister still did not resign. CBI is investigating again. Another committee will be formed. Mr. Modi, the country is asking you some questions – answer them! Why are paper leaks happening repeatedly? Why are you silent time and again on this ‘exam paper discussion’? Why aren’t you dismissing the Education Minister who keeps failing repeatedly?” Rahul wrote on X.