Manipal students protest against exam platform

MANGALURU: Students of Manipal Institute of Technology (MIT), Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE), have intensified their protest on various social media platforms against online sessional end semester exams. They are objecting to the use of the online platform the institute is using to conduct exams.
A group of students who reached out to TOI said MIT has decided to use the ‘PEXA LITE’ platform to conduct exams. Students say installing the software is an issue since it takes control of the computer/ laptop.
“It puts our personal data under serious threat as it can be collected,” students say. “The admin requests us to disable antivirus, which could put our PCs under threat. Moreover, even with the lowest resolution video and high compression files, it will need 250-300mb which will take a lot of time to upload. This means we need high-speed internet connections. This is against the college claim that the process can be taken up offline.”
Lab exams are scheduled to be held in the first week of June and end sessionals from the second week. “Students are under tremendous mental pressure,” they said.
The students said that the software also does not work on OS-MAC. Students say some of their classmates stay in areas where internet connection is poor. Because of this, they were unable to attend online classes. Now with rains lashing the district, power cuts are frequent. Some students have also left their laptops in colleges and unable to arrange for an alternative one.
Dr Narayana Sabhahit, registrar, MAHE, said all students in question have been sent a detailed email from PEXA. The company has stated that the software takes control of Windows OS through a secure exam browser. Sabhahit insisted there is no malware or trojans in the software. “The alerts that you get are false alerts as the firewall/antivirus software looks for certain Windows environments being taken control by the software as a threat. The system is safe with the software,” Sabhahit said.