Bhubaneswar Jan 4 : A group of students in Odisha from Class 10 has filed a petition in the Supreme Court against a school for not sharing detailed scorecards and answer sheets in order to ‘conceal its malpractices’.
A copy of the petition has been presented to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) as to being one of the respondents.
A bench of Justices A M Khanwilkar and C T Ravikumar asked the counsel to share the copy with concerned respondents. The bench said the matter would be listed for hearing on January 17.
The plea, filed by 24 students who have passed out Class 10 from the school in Odisha, has sought direction from the CBSE to review and declare their result afresh on the basis of the board’s evaluation policy after collecting correct records from the school.
It said the CBSE’s Class 10 board examinations were cancelled in April last year amid the Covid-19 pandemic and in May 2021, an assessment policy was notified by the board.
The petition, filed by advocate Ravi Prakash, has urged the top court to direct an inquiry against the school “for illegally demanding money and putting undue pressure to take admission in Class 11 in the same school to get good scores in Class 10”.
It has also sought directions from the school and other respondents to provide rationale documents, attendance sheets of each examination and each subject conducted by the school, and also the detailed scorecard for Class 10 students which had to be prepared in terms of the evaluation policy.
The plea sought directions from the school to provide answer sheets for the petitioners. It said an exemplary cost may be imposed on the school for causing mental trauma and harassment to the petitioner students.
It said CBSE’s regional office had sent a letter to the school directing it to provide relevant data as demanded by the petitioners.
The plea said after receiving a copy of the October 29, 2021 letter from the CBSE regional office, one of the petitioners had visited the school on November 2 last year but in spite of the request and presentation of the copy of the letter, the school refused to provide the answer sheets.