New Delhi, March 28 (IANS) The CBSE faced a hailstorm of rebukes and criticism on Wednesday after it announced that two papers of class X and XII will be re-conducted on account of their being leaked earlier, with the victims admitting the incident has shaken their faith in the school board.

Parents and students in unison dubbed the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) “incompetent” and flayed it for “playing with the future of the students” by re-conducting the maths and economics exams for Class X and Class XII respectively.

“We all are very affected with the news. Why could the CBSE not keep the question paper safe? It speaks a lot about its incompetency,” Tishita Chopra, mother of a Class X student of Shiv Nadar School, told IANS.

“My daughter worked so hard for her exam and was very excited after the paper. But she is completely dejected now and asked me what’s her fault in all this.”

Chopra raised some pertinent questions on the functioning of the board when she said “why did it not have any alternate paper” when it came to know of the leak well before the exam and “why did it not cancel the paper” in the first place, instead of re-conducting it now.

Akanksha Sharma, 15, a Class X student from south Delhi said: “I don’t know what my fault is. Why should I write my math exam again. Just tell me why. It is not my fault. I should not be punished for the paper leak.”

Sharma said she was confident of having done well in her maths exams but is “already stressed and uncertain how it is going to be in a fresh exam”.

Ironically, she said, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had addressed CBSE students in a televised address, asking “us not to fear exams”.

“Is this what he meant we should not fear about,” she said, urging the government to revoke the decision and “not make our lives miserable”.

“Are we supposed to keep our faith in the system, in the board which has failed us before we could have failed in our exams.”

Wahid Sultan, a Kashmiri student studying in Delhi Public School, said whatever the reasons may be “my faith in the professional conduct of the CBSE is shaken”.

“Obviously, the leak may have happened on their front but why punish us. How is it going to help us? Don’t they understand a simple logic that leaked paper would have reached a select few but punishment is given to all. This is like acting greater than God.”

A student of Sardar Patel School in Delhi, Ojas, charged the board with acting like an “absolute authority” and felt “completely helpless” at the situation.

“We were shocked to hear of the news. CBSE knew of the rumours earlier of the paper leaks but it issued a note saying there was no paper leak and went ahead with the exam.

“It reacted very casually then. When a government authority issues a statement we take it very seriously… this is how it (CBSE) is ruining the future of students,” Ojas told IANS.

This year, 16,38,428 students registered for Class X and 11,86,306 for the Class XII board examinations.

–IANS
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