Cuttack/Bhubaneswar: The Board of Secondary Education (BSE) has decided to reschedule the annual High School Certificate (HSC) examinations as the State Election Commission (SEC) has planned to conduct Panchayat elections in February next year.
“The SEC had asked the Board to inform about the probable schedule for the annual HSC examinations. Usually the HSC examinations are held in the last week of February. The Board had received an order from the School and Mass Education department not to conduct HSC examinations in February. But after receiving the letter from the SEC about the schedule of the examinations, the Board has sent a letter to the Commission through School and Mass Education department for approval of the revised examination schedule,” president of the Board of Secondary Education (BSE), Susant Das, told OTV today.
Asked whether the examination could be conducted during the election, Das said no examination can be conducted during the election as the teachers will be engaged in the election process.
“Besides, safety of question papers would be a major problem as the schools, which the Board has identified as nodal centres, will be used for election purpose. Considering the above, the annual HSC examinations would be held tentatively a week after the completion of the poll process. Though we are prepared to conduct the examinations, we have not fixed the examination schedule till date,” he pointed out.
Informing the media, secretary to the SEC, Rabindranath Sahu said the last Panchayat elections were held between February 11 and 19 in 2012. Since the tenure of the Panchayats is going to be completed on March 10 next year, the SEC has decided to start the poll process before March. Though the Commission has not notified the exact date of election, there is every possibility that the election would be held in February next year.
“Keeping this in view, we have informed the School and Mass Education department as well as the Board of Secondary Education to fix a convenient schedule for the HSC examinations keeping the future of about six lakh students in mind so that the examinations and the Panchayat elections can be conducted smoothly,” Sahu added.