Remaining papers of West Bengal Higher Secondary (HS) exams have been cancelled.
Remaining papers of West Bengal Higher Secondary (HS) or Class 12 examswhich were supposed to be conducted in July first and second weeks have been cancelled keeping in mind the safety of students as the COVID-19 pandemic is still raging on. Partha Chatterjee, state education minister, has said today that in the wake of recommendations by an expert committee formed by the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education to guide whether the exams can be held in the present COVID-19 situation, the West Bengal HS exam scheduled on July 2, 6 and 8has been cancelled and added that the marking scheme will be announced later.
"For us, the safety and well-being of students remain the topmost priority. We were making all arrangements to hold the exams on July 2, 6 and 8, but as the coronavirus is spreading, we are left with no alternatives," he said.
The announcement is coming after the Supreme Court today permitted the Centre and the CBSE to cancel the remaining board examinations due to COVID-19 pandemic and gave the go-ahead to its scheme to award marks to students for the cancelled papers scheduled to be held in July.
Mr Chatterjee said the council will shortly announce how the evaluation of the papers, the exams for which had to be cancelled due to the pandemic, will be done. The results of the HS exams will be declared on July 31, reported news agency PTI.
The education minister said if any candidate had reservations about the evaluation method of the remaining papers, he or she can mail an appeal to the HS council for writing those papers after the COVID-19 situation improved and get the new dates for the exams.
While the HS exams for most of the papers were conducted from March 13 to 21, those for some of the papers -- scheduled to be held on March 23, 25 and 27 -- could not be held due to the emerging situation over the coronavirus pandemic.
The papers include education, physics, nutrition, accountancy, Sanskrit, chemistry, economics, mass communication, Persian, Arabic, French, statistics, costing and taxation, home management and family resource management.
Amid spiralling COVID-19 cases in West Bengal, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday announced extension of the lockdown till July 31 with continuance of the existing relaxations. The ongoing lockdown was to end on June 30. Ms Banerjee said all educational institutions will remain closed till July 31.
Before that, Mr Chatterjee on Tuesday said academic activities in all state-run higher educational institutions will remain suspended till July 31 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. He also told reporters the heads of the universities will decide how to conduct administrative functions while safeguarding the health factor of staff.
MrChatterjee had earlier said schools in the state willremain closed till July 31 due to the pandemic situation.