Over 800 SSLC exam candidates in a fix

BENGALURU:  Fate of at least 849 students who are preparing to write their Secondary School Leaving Certificate Examinations (SSLC) exams hangs in balance as their schools have not yet got their annual renewal of recognition (RR). SSLC exams are scheduled to begin on March 21.

Despite repeated warnings from the state department of public instructions, 30 private and aided schools in ten districts of the state have failed to renew the recognition for the current academic year. Now, the students face the possibility of missing out on giving the board exams as the Karnataka Secondary Education Examination Board (KSEEB) has not released their admission tickets to their schools.

“We have not released the admission tickets for the schools which have not got renewal done. We will release the admission tickets if we get the report from concerned Deputy Director of Public Instructions (DDPI) about the same,” said KSEEB director V Sumangala.

As per the Karnataka Education Act and Karnataka Recognition of Education Institutions Act 1999 (Section 3), if the schools have not got their RR for that particular year, then the students from those schools will not be eligible to appear for the SSLC exams.Meanwhile, according to private school management representatives, some schools are having student strength of less than 25 and hence struggling financially. Such schools are not in a position to pay Rs 50,000 to get the RR, they say. The department had issued a circular during September 2018, asking all schools to get their RRs.

The private school association has also alleged that some of the Block Education Officers were keeping the file related to RR pending for bribe. D Shashi Kumar, general secretary of Associated Management of Primary and Secondary Schools in Karnataka, said, “There are instances where authorities at local level are delaying the process for bribe and causing inconvenience to schools.”

NO OTHER OPTION LEFT FOR SCHOOLS
Schools have now no option left, but to get the recognition renewed. They need to complete the renewal process immediately and update the same with the board through the DDPIs.  Earlier, they did have an option to register their own SSLC students for exams through neighbouring schools. But now, the deadline for even that is over.