Exam Boards such as the ICSE, CBSE among others and the Entrance Exam conducting body NTA which conducts NEET, JEE Mains are in dilemma right now. As the COVID Lockdown 2.0 has started, the Government of India has not yet announced its decision regarding these exams. The schools are going to remain shut until this lockdown ends.
As the cases of Coronavirus Pandemic have shown significant increase in the last few days, the Prime Minister of our country Mr Narendra Modi announced his decision to extend the lockdown that had been imposed all over the nation until May 3, 2020. Although it is being expected that after April 20, 2020 the lockdown would be eased in selected places somehow. However, still the schools would remain shut until the lockdown remains enforced.
The Central Government has not taken any decision regarding the future of the School exams. Due to this there is a sense of uncertainty among those students who are going to appear for their respective 10th or 12th Board exams in this academic year.
Several Boards in India such as the Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE), Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) along with their respective state counterparts had already announced their decision to postpone all the exams even before Lockdown 1.0 was enforced.
The CBSE Board exams which was supposed to take place between March 19 and March 31, 2020 have already been cancelled by the Board. Apart from that, those CBSE exams of Class 10th and 12th that were slated to take place at several centres outside the country also stand cancelled.
All the schools affiliated to the CBSE Board have already been directed to promote all the students studying in the classes from 1st to 9th and class 11th to the next class. As for those students of Classes 10th and 12th, the Board is reportedly now planning to exclude those papers which are not considered as Main subjects from the result.
The officials from State Boards have already announced the decision to simply promote the respective students to the next grade. Few other Boards will be releasing the results of the respective exams without conducting those exams which are still pending. Recently, the Odisha Government had announced that all the Schools in this state would remain shut till June 17, 2020. With this announcement, those schools in Odisha which are affiliated to the CBSE or any other National Board would not resume exams till June 17. Similarly, in West Bengal, the schools and colleges would remain shut till June 10, 2020.
The officials from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi (IIT – D) have made this announcement that the institute plans to start the new academic session from the first week of July. Currently, the University of Delhi is considering cancelling the exams of those students who are in First and Second semesters.
Apart from the School and College exams, several Medical and Engineering entrances such as the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) and the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE – Main) have also been postponed – all due to the nationwide lockdown announced because of Coronavirus pandemic.
Most of the national level entrance exams including Medical & Engineering in our country are conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA). The officials from NTA had earlier made this statement that these exams such as JEE Mains & NEET would take place during the last week of May 2020. There are speculations that owing to the lockdown 2.0, the exam dates could get pushed further.