The education boards of at least 10 Indian states saw a considerable increase in the number of absentees for the Class 10 and Class 12 board exams this year, something that officials have attributed to the disruption of teaching and learning caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, according to an IE report.
The examination attendance data of 17 state boards were analysed in the report. Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Telangana, Maharashtra, Nagaland, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal reported a high number of students who registered for the board exams but did not turn up. The report noted that absenteeism was more pronounced for the Class 10 board exams.
Odisha, for instance, recorded 43,489 absentees out of the 5.71 lakh students who had registered for Class 10 board exams this year. The unprecedented percentage of absentees - 7.6 per cent - sparked a state government enquiry into the "missing students".
"The students missed classroom lectures and lost the confidence to appear for the final exams," Odisha Education Minister Samir Ranjan Das told IE. "The students were in Class 8 before the pandemic happened, and missed classes for nearly two years. Many could not join online classes. It is a pan-India issue."
IE's data analysis confirmed Das's statement about absenteeism being a pan-India issue. In Tamil Nadu, the number of students who registered but missed the Class 10 board exams doubled from 21,761 in 2019 to 42,521 in 2022, which is an absentee increase from 2.2 per cent to 4.4 per cent.
Similarly, 14,000 students (3.4 per cent) missed Class 10 board exams in Assam this year, up from 6,488 (1.8 per cent) in 2019. "The pandemic disrupted continuity in the education system," said Assam Education Minister Ranoj Pegu in the report. "Many students did not study, and many lost confidence."
Telangana saw Class 10 exam absenteeism rise from 1,585 (0.3 per cent) in 2019 to 4,909 (1 per cent) in 2022. Maharashtra and Karnataka saw absenteeism increase for the Class 12 exams. Almost 10,000 (0.7 per cent) missed the Class 12 exams in Maharashtra in 2022 as compared with 1,567 (0.1 per cent) in 2019. The number that missed the Class 12 exams in Karnataka rose from 17,553 (2.5 per cent) in 2019 to 26,000 (3.7 per cent) in 2022.
Maharashtra state board chairman Sharad Gosavi said that students were unprepared for offline exams since they had got automatic promotions after the cancellation of exams last year. "This year, just before the boards, we saw protests from several organisations that wanted exams to be held online," Gosavi told IE. "We think a lot of candidates had expected that offline exams would be cancelled this year as well… so, there may have been students who filled examination forms but didn’t turn up for the exams as they weren’t prepared."
Deccan Herald did not independently verify the information presented in the IE report.