JOIN USThere has once again been goof-ups in the questions for the JEE-Advance test: Four of the 60 multiple-choice questions listed in the Paper-1 of the test had alternate correct answers, which were not originally proposed.
Ambiguity in the answers has been discovered in question number 18 of physics as well as question numbers 26, 29 and 33 of chemistry in paper-1 of the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE)-Advance, conducted by the Joint Admission Board (JAB) of the IITs.
The JEE-Advance is conducted for select candidates for admission to the IITs as well as the Indian School of Mines in Dhanbad. IIT-Kharagpur was in charge of conducting the nationwide test this year.
According to sources, the board has decided to expand the scope of these four contentious questions and give marks to candidates who attempted them and gave correct answers, including the alternate ones, which were not initially proposed. Each of these four question carry three marks for a correct answer.
“No student will be affected. Candidates will be given marks for giving the correct answer including the alternate ones, which was not originally proposed for these questions,” JAB sources told Deccan Herald.
The ambiguity in the answers of the questions came to light after the JAB uploaded the answer keys on its website. For the first time, the board officially allowed queries on answers from students and stakeholders regarding the answer keys before evaluating the optical response sheets (ORS). This came after a recent order of the Delhi High Court on a petition seeking more transparency in the system.
“The correct answer for question number 18 of physics was initially proposed to be a single-digit integer while it had two correct answers—2 and 8. There could be one or more than one choices amongst (A), (B), (C) and (D) as correct answer for question number 26 of Chemistry,” said an expert who analysed the questions and answers, requesting anonymity
JAB sources said there was a mistake in translation of question number 29 of chemistry into Hindi, which led to ambiguity in its answers.
“After the examination every year, as many as 21 experts from all the seven IITs review and analyse the questions and their answers. It was found that there were alternate correct answers possible for the four questions in paper-1. The board decided to give marks for those alternate answers too,” said the sources.
This is not first time ambiguity in the answers of the JEE-Advance questions have been discovered after the test. Answers of as many as six questions were found to be ambiguous in the nationwide test conducted last year.