At 93%, Class X results fail to match last year's success rate

NEW DELHI: The CBSE Class X examination pass percentage across the country this year is 93.1%. This is an improvement on the pre-COVID strike rate of 2019 when the pass percentage was 91.1%, but this year's success rate is 1.3% lower when compared with last year's.
The pass percentage in the Delhi region is 89.2%.

Out of the 21.6 lakh students who sat for the exam this year across the country, around 20.1 lakh cleared it. Last year, of the 20.9 lakh students who appeared, 1.9 lakh successfully cleared it.
Like in Class XII, the number of high scorers in Class X saw a drop this time. Compared to 2.3 lakh students who scored between 90% and 95% last year, 1.9 lakh scored in the corresponding range in 2023.
This year, 44,297 students scored 95% and above while last year it was 64,908. The number of high scorers in 2022 was a record high in the past six years.
Despite seeing a 0.6% dip against last year, girls again outperformed boys with a pass percentage of 94.5%. The overall pass percentage among boys is 92.3%.
School principals attributed the dip in pass percentage to the pandemic and its resultant learning loss.
Tania Joshi, the principal of The Indian School, said: "Even though the dip in pass percentage in our school is not a lot, the pandemic has definitely had an effect as children got used to online teaching. The transition to offline classes took some time and over the period, the attention span of children also reduced."
The overall pass percentage clocked a record high in 2021 when 99% students cleared the examination.
In 2022, the board examinations were held in two segments with the syllabi divided accordingly.
Priyanka Gulati, the principal of Evergreen Public School, pointed out that when the batch that got the results on Friday was in Class IX, "most" students were promoted because of guidelines by the board and the directorate. "We had promoted almost all the students. This is the Covid batch and somewhere down the line, it has affected results," she said. "As classes were online earlier, the retention capacity of many students was affected ."
Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya retained top spot like last year and recorded a pass percentage of 99.1% as compared to last year's 99.7%. The Kendriya Vidyalayas showed an improvement of 1.4% from last year with a pass percentage of 98% this year.
Private schools recorded a pass percentage of 95.3% this year when in 2022 they had recorded a 96.9% success rate. Government-aided schools improved their pass percentage from last year's 76.7% to 81.6% this year. The performance of government schools was the weakest this year with a pass percentage of 80.4%.
The pass percentage among children with special needs stood at 92.6% this year when last year it was 93.4%.
At 90%, the pass percentage of transgender students remained the same as last year.
Among the other regions, Thiruvananthapuram topped the list with a pass percentage of 99.9%, followed by Bengaluru at 99.2% and Chennai at 99.1%.
The board did not release a list of toppers. It will issue merit certificates to the top 0.1% students who scored the highest marks in subjects.