'Who wanted Coempt to win?': Rahul Gandhi questions 'lowered bar' in CBSE OSM contract row

New Delhi: As the union government told the Supreme Court that the Prime Minister is personally monitoring the NEET paper leak issue, top Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday shot back, claiming that Narendra Modi is "also personally" supervising the "NEET paper leak".

Separately, he also asked whether the OSM contract to Coempt Edutech from the CBSE was given "honestly" as he alleged that the futures of 18.5 lakh children were handed to a company that could only qualify after the rules were bent for it.

Tagging a news report on the union government's submission in the apex court, he posted on 'X', "PM Modi also personally supervised the NEET paper leak."

In a separate post, the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha claimed that the CBSE called for OSM (On Screen Marking) tenders thrice and there zero bids the first time while in the second one no qualified bidder qualified. Finally, he alleged, the technical bar was lowered until Coempt Edutech "could clear it".

Referring to a media report, he said on 'X', "scanning resolution cut. Robotic scanner requirement dropped. CMMI certification lowered from Level 5 to Level 3. Penalties for errors in answer sheets removed. TCS, India’s biggest IT services company, qualified in the third round too. TCS lost. Coempt - a company with a spectacular track record of failure - won."

"And what are CBSE students complaining about today? Badly scanned answer sheets. Missing pages. A broken evaluation portal. Teachers had warned CBSE that the OSM system needed at least a year or two for further preparation before nationwide implementation, yet it was rushed through. So I ask again - who wanted Coempt to win? Who lowered the bar, step by step, until this company could clear it?" he said.

Rahul said Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and CBSE say "due process was followed" but that is "not an answer, that is not accountability", as the question is whether the contract was "honestly awarded to the best company" which could do the job correctly.

"The futures of 18.5 lakh children were handed to a company that could only qualify after the rules were bent for it," he said.

Referring to allegations that Congress governments in states have engaged Coempt, he said he has demanded an independent judicial probe and the government can expand it from CBSE to every contract awarded to the company.

"Our youth deserve the truth. And Modi-ji, your silence on the CBSE debacle and inaction against the Education Minister tells the country what you actually care about - not the futures of lakhs of students, only the survival of your own government," he added.