The number of students appearing for Punjab School Education Board (PSEB)’s Class 12 examinations in the border district under open school scheme has seen a dip of whooping 92 per cent as compared to the last year. The sharp decline in the number of students in the district was attributed to a crackdown carried out by the state education department last year.

“Only 499 students will be appearing for Class 12 exams under the open school. However, the counts of students was more than 6,000 last year,” said district education officer (DEO-secondary) Nirmal Singh.

He said, “We are not conducting exams in those 34 schools which were penalised last year for allowing mass copying. The students of these schools are taking exams in other schools. Even, these schools have not got any admission under Open School scheme this year.”

Earlier, the district earned notoriety after the education department had unearthed ‘cash for copying’ racket in different schools here during the last year’s Class 12 exam.

As many as 4,839 students were caught cheating and the education department had imposed a fine of ₹25,000 per student caught in around 34 private schools.

The then SDM had filed a report after his inquiry on mass copying that came to light after raids by senior officials of the education department. The report had pointed out that the practice of allowing cheating in these schools had been going on for the past few decades. In violation of rules, open school students from other districts appeared in schools of Tarn Taran.

As per the education department, the total number of students appearing for PSEB Class 12 exams, which began on March 1, from the district this year is 17,803. Last year, 21,734 students had taken exams in Tarn Taran schools. On the contrary, the number of students taking the exam in the state has increased to 3,13,202 this year from 3,00,417 last year.

This year, the education department has made 96 examination centres in the district. But there were 116 exam centres last year.

Tarn Taran deputy commissioner Pardeep Kumar Sabarwal is monitoring the exams this year. He has constituted four special teams under the supervision of four SDMs of the district to keep strict watch on every activity during the exams.

First Published: Mar 09, 2019 07:49 IST