SC to consider plea for cancelling Class XII state board exams by Punjab, Assam, Tripura and Andhra Pradesh

The Supreme Court on Thursday decided to consider a plea for cancelling Class XII board examinations by Assam, Punjab, Tripura and Andhra Pradesh and Class XI by Kerala.

After giving in-principle approval for the evaluation scheme prepared by the CBSE and ICSE boards, a bench presided over by Justice A M Khanwilkar agreed to take up on June 21 a plea for rescinding other states' board examinations.

The court noted a submission on behalf of petitioner-advocate Anubha Shrivastava Sahai and others that out of 28 states, six states had already conducted the Class XII board examinations and 18 states had cancelled it. However, four states namely, Assam, Punjab, Tripura and Andhra Pradesh have not cancelled the examination as of now.

The counsel also submitted Kerala has not cancelled the 11th standard examination conducted by the state board.

The court asked the counsel to serve a copy of the petition to states concerned for their response on the next date of hearing on Monday, June 21.

A meeting headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on June 1 decided to cancel CBSE board examinations in view of the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. Subsequently, other Boards followed suit by announcing a similar move.

However, no decision was taken by the four states.

On Thursday, the top court gave in-principle approval of a scheme, prepared by the CBSE and ICSE for assessing the Class XII students after the cancellation of the examinations due to the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. Both the boards proposed to declare the final results by July 31.