Six States Against Conducting Final Semester Exams; UGC Guidelines To Be Followed Mandatorily

Within India, six states have expressed the cancellation of final year examinations due to COVID-19. Whereas the HRD Ministry has asserted that the guidelines issued by UGC have to be followed mandatorily.

UGC had released a revised guideline last week which stated all the higher educational institutions to conduct final year examinations by September 2020, instead of July 2020.

Citing the pandemic and increasing positive cases, Maharashtra, Delhi, Punjab, Odisha, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal have announced reservations against the plan.

A senior HRD Ministry official said, "The guidelines have not stated that the exams have to be conducted right away, they have to be included by September end. States can devise a calendar whenever it is feasible to conduct the exams. Also, the exams can be conducted in online/offline/blended mode. Totally doing away with exams is not a feasible decision. The UGC guidelines are binding in nature."

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He further added that academic evaluation is a very important milestone in any education system. The performance in examinations five satisfaction and confidence to the students and is also a reflection of competence and credibility, that is necessary for global acceptability. 

As per reports, the HRD Ministry may meet the state education secretaries this week to ensure uniformity in the final assessment of students.

"Top-ranking universities of the world have opted to conduct final examinations remotely. Colleges and Universities like Princeton and MIT, Imperial College of London, University of Cambridge, University of Hong Kong, University of Heidelberg, University of Toronto, and McMaster have resorted to the online technology-based model of conducting exams", said an official.

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As per the guidelines released, the first and second-year students are exempted from the exams and will be assessed on the basis of internal assessments and previous year/semester performance.