Janjivan Bureau / New Delhi ; The Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed a petition seeking cancellation of offline physical board examinations for Classes 10 and 12 conducted by various state boards, CBSE, NIOS and ICSE, saying “Such petitions give false hopes to Students.”
A Bench led by Justice AM Khanwilkar said the petition was “ill-advised” and “premature” as the authorities were yet to take decisions regarding the conduct of examinations.
”If the decisions of authorities are not in accordance with rules and the Act, it will be open to aggrieved persons to challenge it,” the top court noted.
Noting that such petition will mislead students, the Bench said, “For the last three days we have been seeing news items everywhere. What kind of petitions are filed and publicity is being given… This has to stop. This will create confusion. You can’t file PILs like this.”
Advocate Prashant Padmanabhan – who had on Tuesday mentioned it for urgent listing – pointed out that the top court had last year passed orders regarding alternate assessment for board examinations.
“What happened in the past cannot be the basis for the present relief,” said the Bench rejecting the plea. It even threatened to impose costs on the petitioners but later chose not to do so.
Highlighting the COVID-19 situation and the difficulties faced by them due to interruptions in schooling, students from several states moved the Supreme Court against holding board exams offline. Maintaining that education is important, they sought to emphasise that the lives and mental health of children, teachers, staff and parents were more important.
The petitioners – who approached the top court through child rights activist Anubha Shrivastava Sahai and Students Union of Odisha – have sought a direction to the University Grants Commission to set up a panel to declare admission dates for various universities and to work out an assessment formula for admission to non-professional courses.
They have demanded an alternative assessment method for the board exams. They urged the top court to direct all boards to declare results on time and give an option for improvement exams on account of problems caused by the pandemic.
The Central Bureau of Secondary Education (CBSE), Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (ICSE) and various state boards have proposed to hold physical exams for Class 10 and Class 12.
The CBSE has decided to conduct term two board exams for classes 10 and 12 from April 26, respectively, while ICSE and National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) were yet to notify the dates, the petitioners said. Some state boards have announced the schedule while many others have yet to take a decision.
