New Delhi, April 3: Human resource development minister Arjun Singh is now taking a crack at exam reform, much in the manner that successive governments since Independence have done.

At a meeting held recently, experts put their heads together to draw up a tentative list of suggestions to lessen exam-related stress for students. Singh said the government would chart out a broad plan for reform in the next two months.

Not that such things have not been tried before ? in fact, they have been tried much too often but have not gotten too far. So, the general feeling in education circles is Singh might not get very far either.

?Successive governments over four decades have recommended exam reforms. Little has been done to implement them,? an official said.

The idea of exam reform was first mooted way back in 1952 by the first elected Congress government of independent India. It had drawn up a seven-point proposal, three of which ? including compartmental exams for students failing in a subject or two and reduction in the number of external exams ? were implemented down the years.

But nothing has yet been done about the two most crucial recommendations that would actually bring relief to students: replacing the numerical marking system with grades and continual internal evaluation.

They remain on paper till today although educationists, ministry officials and school boards have been tirelessly plugging for them.

According to the 1952 recommendations of the secondary education commission: ?The system of symbolic rather than numerical marking should be adopted for evaluating and grading the work of the pupil in external and internal examinations and in maintenance of school records.

?In the final assessment of pupils, due credit should be given to the internal tests and their school records.?

But even 50 years later, students continue to be assessed only at the final exam. Their performance in school has little bearing on the final results.

The list also suggested: ?There should be one public examination at the completion of the secondary school course.? But students continue to grapple with two sets of exams ? one after class X and another after class XII.

In 1964, a fresh set of reform ideas was floated. That year, the Education Commission said question papers should be more objective-type than geared towards ?acquisition of knowledge?.

A ministry official said this recommendation appears to have been accepted as question papers have increasingly become objective-type.

During Rajiv Gandhi?s regime, a draft national policy on education harped on the need to change the curriculum.

In 1990, the Ramamurti review panel did the same. Over a decade later, the UPA is highlighting the same concerns.