The Supreme Court on Monday, 31 May, adjourned the hearing of a plea seeking cancellation of Class 12 CBSE and the ICSE board examinations. The plea is now scheduled for hearing on Thursday, noting that competent authorities are examining all aspects, following which they are likely to take a decision which will be placed before the court.
The petition, filed by Advocate Mamta Sharma, seeks to cancel the Class 12 board exams administered by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) and the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE) in view of the COVID-19 health emergency.
Attorney General KK Venugopal told the court on Monday that the government will make the final decision in the next two days.
The court said that while the petitioners hope that last year’s policy could be used this year, the government must provide tangible reasons to depart from those policies if it decides to do so.
The apex court said that last year’s examination policies had been decided after a lot of deliberations.
The court also considered another petition, arguing that the exams should not be called off. That petition is filed by advocate Tony Joseph.
In the previous hearing, the matter was adjourned after the court had asked the petitioner to serve advance copies of the plea to respondents, including the Centre, the CBSE and the ICSE. The court had directed that the CBSE, the ICSE and the Centre should be represented in the hearing.
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