Osmania University debars 30, 000 students from writing exams

A staggering 30,000 students have been barred from sitting in the annual undergraduate examination under Osmania University in a massive crackdown to improve extremely poor attendance across colleges in the city and send a strong message to students bunking classes, authorities said on Thursday.

About 70,000 students out of 1 lakh registered students are now sitting for the examinations which began last week and will continue till the end of November, senior officials said.

"As per strict instructions of Osmania University (OU) about 30,000 students were detained due to lack of attendance from across all under graduate colleges which are affiliated to the university," G Biskshmaiah, Controller of Examination at OU, told TOI.

"The university cannot be lenient with candidates who have just about 20% attendance," he added.

Authorities cracked the whip to bring some discipline back into the system after they found thousands of students had zero-20 % attendance throughout the academic year and did not take steps to improve their attendance.

Officials admit that it was needless to say that regular strikes at the university demanding separate state of Telangana also had a toll on attendance.

Two days of strike last week following suicide by D Santosh Kumar, a PhD aspirant in the university campus was an example of how crucial working days are lost.

Authorities also barred several student union leaders with poor attendance from sitting in the examination. Some of them spearheaded the T-issue demonstration and prevented other students from entering classes.

Several student leaders of Telangana agitation from OU's constituent colleges figured from Secunderabad PG College and Nizam College.

"We have missed classes for a political cause. The state government should intervene and allow students who were part of the agitation to appear for the examination," said S Prashant, student leader of Nizam College in Basheerbagh.

The academic year itself was short this time and the Telangana strikes made it worse by causing disruption of classes for at least 15 days.

Debarred students plan protests

Managements of top city colleges said as per the instructions of the university, they had kept a strict online log of attendance and hence the crackdown was easier as identifying the erring students was not difficult.

Students who were denied a chance to write the examination which started last week are planning to protest. About 135 students who were detained in Loyola Degree College, Alwal had submitted a memorandum to the college authorities asking them to write off their attendance shortage.

In Villa Marie College for Women, Somajiguda, 30 students who were detained have also staged a protest. The students who miss the examination this November will have to forego an academic year to clear the papers.

The management representatives said most students who were detained due to attendance shortage are those who have been bunking college regularly for personal reasons.

CAT 2012 ends

Nearly 3,000 students from city appeared for the Common Admission Test (CAT) 2012 which came to an end on Tuesday. The examination was held at a single centre and was conducted within a window period of 21 days. The results are likely to be declared in the month of January.

According to experts, the paper was easy in initial slots of the CAT and it got tougher as it came to conclusion. The paper of data interpretation and quantitative aptitude section was tough as compared to that of logical reasoning, one of them added.

According to the organizing body Prometric, there has been a rise of five per cent in the number of candidates registering for the examination this year.

Re-examination for '08-09 B Ed students

The department of higher education (DHE) is mulling to conduct examination for the B Ed students of session 2008 and 2009 whose admission process had come under dispute due to recognition status of colleges. Only those students, who were allotted counselling date and time, will be allowed to take the exam.

The decision was made in a meeting of DHE officials with the registrars in the state capital on Tuesday. "We had a meeting and we have decided to conduct examination for candidates who were called for counselling. Dates will be announced once we get a written consent from the government," R D Musalgaonkar, registrar, Devi Ahilya Vishwavidyalaya, said.

The admission process had run into dispute when DHE had stopped the process due to controversies related to recognition of B Ed colleges. Following the DHE action, the colleges had moved court for its opinion as they had started taking admission in colleges. The court had constituted a team to find out the status of counselling in colleges. The team had found that few colleges had started taking admission. The court had then directed to conduct re-examination of the aspirants and declare the results. Relating to it a meeting was held on Tuesday, which decided to conduct examination for those students who had been called for counselling.

Mass copying suspected in HSC exam at Bhandara

A mass copying pattern has been detected in the HSC chemistry paper held in March at a centre in Bhandara district. The state board office in Nagpur has set up an inquiry committee to investigate the alleged mass copying at Vinod High School and Junior College located in Gosebuj taluka.

Chandramani Borkar, divisional chairman of the state board, said, "We have received an official complaint of a copying pattern being detected. Statements of students, invigilators and other staff are being recorded and final report will be sent to the headquarters soon."

The report is expected to be finished by next week, just before the HSC results are declared. A board official said that proving such cases in the court of law is also an uphill task since every copy is not verbatim. About 200 students were present in the centre for the chemistry exam, but it is not known exactly how many copies are under scrutiny.

Ashish Mate, general secretary of Indian Youth Congress from Bhandara, said, "We are going to call for the answer sheets of the entire centre under RTI and then the truth will be revealed. The education officials on inspection duty that day had mentioned that everything was in order during the chemistry paper, which certainly does not seem to be the case."