The West Bengal board exams for Classes X and XII will be held as planned in March-April.
Speculations about the board exams being deferred have been doing the rounds since schools were shut down in West Bengal amid a surge in COVID cases.
The Higher Secondary exams for Class XII students are scheduled to be held from April 2 to 20 and the Madhyamik exams for Class X from March 7 to 16.
“Conducting online exams is not feasible. A large number of students in the rural areas won’t be able to afford smartphones with high-speed internet. We would like to hold the exams offline. There is no plan to change the schedule as of now,” said Chiranjib Bhattacharya, the president of the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education, which conducts the Higher Secondary examinations. “We cannot predict the turn of events. We can only hope things will get better.”
Bhattacharya said the council was hopeful that students this year “wouldn’t have to struggle like those over the past two years”.
Kalyanmoy Ganguly, the president of the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education, which conducts the Madhyamik, said, “We won’t be thinking of any alternative evaluation criteria for the time being. Arrangements for holding offline tests are in full swing.”
Board exams had to be cancelled in 2021 because of the second wave of the pandemic. Students were assessed based on an alternative evaluation system.
Students returned to schools in West Bengal on November 16, after a gap of 20 months. Schools were once again declared shut from January 3. Vaccination camps are now being held for 15-18-year-olds.