Board exams in Karnataka: Students in a fix Premium

Sangeetha, a class 9 student in Bengaluru, expresses confusion as board exams for classes 5, 8, and 9 are postponed.

“On Wednesday, I had a Hindi exam. I was well prepared. But our teacher informed us the previous day that the exam had been postponed. I don’t know when the exams will start again. We are really confused,” said Sangeetha, a class 9 student who studies in a private school in Bengaluru.

On March 12, the Supreme Court set aside the interim order of a division bench of the High Court of Karnataka, which had given the State government a green signal to conduct board exams for the summative assessment of students of classes 5, 8, and 9. Following the apex court order, the Education Department stopped the exams of these classes, which began on March 11. This was the third twist within a week to the saga of whether or not students of these classes can be made to write a board examination.

On March 6, a single-judge bench of the High Court quashed the examination process for classes 5, 8, and 9, citing procedural lapses, after the Organisation for Unaided Recognized Schools and Registered Unaided Private Schools Management Association, Karnataka, took the issue to court.

However, the Karnataka government challenged it before a division bench, which stayed the single-bench order. Following this, exams began on March 11 (Monday) as per schedule.

The association then approached the Supreme Court. The apex court said that “prima facie the notifications [to hold board exams] appear to be issued in violation of the provisions contained in Section 30 of the RTE Act,” which states that no child is required to pass any Board exam till completion of elementary education, that is class 1 to 8.

Though the apex court said that “the government should not be permitted to hold board exams for these classes and thereby unnecessarily creating complication in education policy affecting the career of students as the single-judge bench had already quashed notifications as illegal”, it said that the division bench of the High Court could decide government’s appeal on merit without being influenced by its observations.

By the time the apex court passed its order, class 5 students had completed two of their four exams, and classes 8 and 9 had two of their six. Exams for these classes stand postponed until further orders, while class 11 exams are already over.