Stringent ‘Copy-free Drive’ to be implemented in board exams

Mumbai: To curb the menace of copying in exams and to weed out the nexus between politically linked institutions and officials from the education department, the state government has announced a ‘copy-free’ drive, which will be supported by the kind of multi-layer vigilance system that exists during the general elections

Mumbai:

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To curb the menace of copying in exams and to weed out the nexus between politically linked institutions and officials from the education department, the state government has announced a ‘copy-free’ drive, which will be supported by the kind of multi-layer vigilance system that exists during the general elections. The drive will begin on February 21 with the board exams.

A vigilance committee comprising officials, flying squads monitored by collectors, and superintendents of police will keep a hawk’s eye on the proceedings, which includes searching students appearing for the exams. Harking back to what happened in Nanded in 2009 when a similar drive was undertaken, the state government expects the pass percentage of the SSC and HSC boards to drop drastically this year.

The decision was taken on the basis of Nanded 2009 as well as reports of large-scale cheating reported in Marathwada, Vidarbha and North Maharashtra. “Three high-level district officers will monitor the drive, especially on the days of the English, maths and science exams—the subjects that record the highest cases of cheating,” said a Mantralaya official. “Officials will remain present at the exam centres right from the arrival of the question papers to the handing over of the answer sheets. The committee will ensure that no unscrupulous elements are present, and students are properly scanned. The names of the officials and the details of their deployment will be kept under wraps to avoid any connivance.”

The exam centres have been categorised as ‘hypersensitive’, ‘sensitive’ and ‘general’, with entry within 50 metres of all centres prohibited to unauthorised persons. The centres in the institutions linked to politicians are in the ‘hypersensitive’ category, while the ‘sensitive’ ones are those from where many cheating cases were reported in the past. The sensitive centres will be videographed during the exams, and photocopying shops will be banned outside all examination centres.

The state cabinet on Tuesday cleared the proposal after a presentation by Shrikar Pardeshi, who had implemented the drive in Nanded in 2009 when he was the collector. After Pardeshi’s presentation to a group of ministers last week, chief secretary Manukumar Srivastava held a video conference with district administrations on February 10 in order to implement the drive.

The drive was first held in Nanded after the district administration found that a whopping 3,500 students had secured over 90 percent. “When the administration checked the answer sheets, they found that every student had the same answers, copied from the model answers provided by the exam centre authorities,” said another Mantralaya officer. “These centres would charge students up to one lakh rupees for the ‘model answers’. Centres which assured students over 80 percent in the board exams had mushroomed in Nanded and other districts of central Maharashtra.”

A senior BJP minister revealed that the centres which had political links would provide photocopied model answers. “These centres attracted hundreds of students from other parts of the state,” he said. “One centre in a village in Jalna had four times more students than the population of the village. A minister from Jalgaon apprised the cabinet that students from his district used to go to a district in central Maharashtra to appear for the exams.”

An official said that the government feared a big drop in the pass percentage this year. “The pass percentage in the SSC exam in Nanded in 2009 was 90 percent, which dropped to 31 percent the year the drive was implemented,” he said. “We expect a similar drop this year. But the political leadership has decided to be prepared for this to raise the standards of education. Nanded too has undergone a tremendous transformation since then and now produces civil servants, doctors and IITians, which was not the case before 2009.”