Amid the controversy surrounding holding examinations for final-year students and common entrance tests for various professional courses, a survey among students conducted by the All-India Democratic Students’ Organisation (AIDSO) has found that about 90% of the respondents were averse to the idea of sitting for exams amid the pandemic.

The online survey was conducted in 30 districts of the State, on a sample size of around 12,000 students. The organisation circulated Google Forms through social media seeking the opinion of students.

In the survey of students of various degree courses, including engineering, questions were asked on whether they were ready to face examination.

The engineering students were asked whether they were ready to face the final-year exam in August, while the other degree and postgraduate students were asked about appearing from exams in September. In both cases, over 90% of the respondents answered in the negative.

In the survey of engineering students, only 142 said they were ready to appear for the exam, while 3,839 (96.43%) said the opposite. Among the other degree and postgraduate students, 662 expressed willingness to appear for the exam, while 5,581 (89.39%) said they were against doing so amid the COVID-19 crisis.

In the survey on the Karnataka Common Entrance Test (KCET) for getting admission to various professional courses, 96.9% of the 4,557 respondents said the exam should be put off.

On classes

AIDSO also asked the engineering students about whether they would attend classes if they were held from August. A total of 6,322 students took part in the survey, and only 4% were in favour of attending classes. While 86.6% of the respondents said they would not attend classes, 9.6% were unsure and answered with “maybe”.

AIDSO has urged the State government to consider the students’ feedback before going ahead with any plan on conducting exams.