The CBSE on Monday filed an additional affidavit in the Supreme Court announcing that disputes regarding computation of final marks derived using the alternative marking system will be referred to a committee that has been constituted by the CBSE.

CBSE said the final result will be announced on July 31. More significantly the CBSE affidavit said the board will provide an online facility for registration for the optional exam for those who wish to opt for it, and exams will only be held for main subjects when the situation conducive. But the affidavit has specified the tentative period of exams hinting that it may be held between Aug 15-Sept 15, 2021. 

The affidavit filed by CBSE Controller Of Examinations Sanyam Bharadwaj through Rupesh Kumar, the Board’s standing counsel in SC, said: “Regarding the date before which the optional examinations for the candidates who are not satisfied with their assessment, their examination will be conducted any time between 15.08.2021 to 15.09.2021, subject to the conducive situation.” 

Marks obtained in the optional exam will be treated as final marks of those who opt for it, it says. It is to be noted that the grievance redressal committee has been constituted on the directions of the Supreme Court which said in case the students apply for correction of the final result declared by the concerned boards, there should be an inbuilt mechanism in the scheme to address the grievance of students about marks obtained by him after the declaration of results or if he/she wanted a correction.

SC had said no prejudice should be caused to students in any manner. The court, which is hearing petitions filed by SC advocate Mamta Sharma on a slew of issues affecting Class 12 CBSE students, had on the last date in principle approved the CBSE’s alternative evaluation/assessment scheme which said marks will be based on the past three years performance of the student on a 40:30:30 weightage that is 40% of the marks for 12th pre-board and 60% weightage will be given to the performance of the students in Class 11 and Class 10 final exams-30% each.

Though the court had endorsed the alternative evaluation criteria and allowed them to go ahead with it, but had asked the boards to incorporate three aspects which the CBSE has now incorporated. 

Meanwhile adjourning to tomorrow the hearing of petitions filed by several parties related to the exams, bench led by Justice A M Khanwilkar said it will tomorrow consider the following issues raised by senior advocate Vikas Singh who sought review of the decision to cancel the exams. The court will look into if-

1. If a student wants to appear for the exam it should be made clear at inception 
2. If criteria of CBSE and ICSE should be the same 
3. If results should be announced together 
4. ICSE has frozen the data which hasn’t been done by CBSE 

Tomorrow the court will also hear pleas seeking cancellation of board exams and on the last date issued notice to Assam, Punjab, Tripura and Andhra Pradesh who had not cancelled Class 12 board exams and also to Kerala which did not cancel Class 11 exams.

But after that Assam, Punjab and Tripura cancelled the exams. So only Andhra Pradesh remained. So out of 28 states, 21 have already cancelled, 6 already held only Andhra remains.

SC will also hear the petition filed by 1,152 Class12 students for cancellation of the CBSE CLASS XII 2nd chance compartment and private exams.

Moving the court through advocate Abhishek Choudhary, they seek direction to Board to adopt alternative marking criteria akin to one approved for regular students. 

Choudhary argued that “Owing to the prevailing Covid-19 situation in the country, it cannot be conclusively said, as to when exactly we will be able to have such conducive environment necessary for the conduct of physical mode examinations.” 

“If their examinations are delayed beyond reasonable time till a conducive environment is achieved in order to conduct the examination, they will not only lose the opportunity to apply and seek admission in these universities/colleges but they will also be denied their fundamental right to education,” he argued. 

The application has also highlighted the dual and arbitrary approach taken by the CBSE in giving unequal treatments to the private/patrachar/2nd chance compartment candidates of Class X and XII.

Earlier, the CBSE declared that, for Class X, a separate scheme for the assessment will be announced soon for private/patrachar/2nd chance compartment candidates.  

Advocate Choudhary’s petition has also said that “the decision to conduct private/compartment/repeaters examination of Class XII CBSE Board candidates would endanger the life of lakhs of students, who would be forced to appear in this physical-mode-board examination, which would clearly violate their ‘right to life and health’ as guaranteed by Article 21 of our Constitution.”

Speaking to Times Now, Abhishek Choudhary, the advocate for the interveners and a Supreme Court lawyer, said that, the present situation is not conducive for conducting any type of physical mode examination, for any class of students. 

No one can say the exact date when the situation would be conducive, and, therefore, we have approached the Hon’ble Supreme Court seeking appropriate reliefs in the interest of the students.