Candidates appear for matriculation examination at a centre in Berhampur. Picture by Gopal Krishna Reddy

Cuttack, Feb. 25: The newly introduced optical mark recognition (OMR) sheets were accepted with cheers on the first day of the matriculation examination here today.

A record number of over six lakh students, including 5,54,644 regular students, appeared for the matriculation examination conducted in 2,735 centres in different parts of the state.

“Though we were apprehensive about how to tackle OMR sheets, the examination went on very well. It was quite easy to circle the right answer, rather than writing it down on paper,” said Sweta Mishra, a student.

“It’s the best for present age students as entrance examinations that we will take in the future will be in the same format,” said Subrat Panda, another student.

“This format of objective questions gives us the chance to score maximum marks,” said Ramesh Sahu, another student.

School and mass education secretary Usha Padhee, who visited a few schools here to take stock of the arrangements at the examination centres, said her personal interactions with students revealed that they were comfortable and satisfied with the new pattern and the OMR sheets.

The first day remained incident-free and minor confusions that arose were resolved through the helpline, she said.

While roll numbers of individual examinees were to be printed on OMR answer sheets, in some centres students complained that those were missing.

The students were promptly given new OMR sheets and asked to mention their roll numbers on it, president of the Board of Secondary Education (BSE) D.P. Nanda said today.

Despite tough measures, 367 students were caught for indulging in malpractices. To prevent copying, 75 district level squads and 52 central squads were on vigil today.

The BSE had in place a three-tier security measure to conduct the exam in a transparent manner.