Exam Bribe Gains Currency

HSLC examinees attach money, prayers to answer scripts

By Daulat Rahman

Guwahati, Apr 20 : Currency notes, personal letters and medical certificates. All are found inside answer-scripts in Assam. Even neighboring West Bengal appears to be keeping pace, though its examinees are far more thrifty with cash!

Thousands of evaluators of this year’s High School Leaving Certificate examination in Assam are amused to find “something” they did not expect inside answer-scripts of nearly four lakh examinees.

The secretary of the Board of Secondary Education, Assam, (SEBA), Dhanadev Mahanta, told The Telegraph that though the candidates used to attach personal notes and currency notes to answer-scripts in previous years too, the number of such incidents had gone up significantly.

He said instances of medical certificates attached to answer-scripts to earn pass marks had even come to the light.

“There are reports that candidates have attached currency notes of different denomination totaling Rs 1,000 to Rs 1,500. While the board has strictly instructed the evaluators not to succumb to the examinees’ tactics of alluring them, money found inside the answer-scripts is being used to sponsor snacks, tea and lunch for the evaluators,” Mahanta said.

“It was really a surprising as well as an amusing experience for me when I found a personal letter along with Rs 1,000 inside an answer-script of general science. The candidate in the letter wrote that he had found mathematics and science very tough to comprehend and considered the subjects as a curse on his life. He would be grateful if the evaluator gave pass marks to overcome the curse,” an evaluator said.

The principal of Cotton Collegiate Government HS School, Pabitra Kumar Deka, said such incidents prove the candidates’ total loss self-confidence to come out with flying colors in the matric examination.

He said there had been cases when beautiful and charming girls clipped their photographs on the very first page of their answerscripts to impress the examiners.

“A rise in the number of such cases is, however, a matter of concern and reflection of the negative side of society. Resorting to such practice must be seen as bribery. As corruption has become rampant in every sphere of society, students must have started thinking that attaching currency notes to answer-scripts would bring them success at important examination like matric without any study,” Deka said.

The principal of B. Borooah College, Dinesh Baishya, likes to add a different angle to such incident.

“Matric is the target of thousands of guardians for their children, particularly in rural Assam. For them passing matric is the way to get a job, even to get a good bride/groom. So matric has psychological and social implications.”

S. Dasgupta of Loreto College, Calcutta, who is a regular examiner, says she has come across instances of currency notes (not more than Rs 500 though) being attached to answerscripts. “These are usually accompanied by a “prayer” on the last page to help them clear the exam because they are from poor families.

“The pleas generally come from girls in rural areas, who say they will not be able to find a good husband unless they have cleared school. We hand over the cash to head examiners.”

The headmaster of a school in West Bengal’s North 24-Parganas district, D. Sen, who examines Higher Secondary papers, says it is pretty common to find pleas from students in answer-scripts. So far, he has come across only entreaties and prayers, but has heard of Rs 100 notes being attached.

Letters inside answer scripts written by students requesting examiners to give them pass marks are found almost every year in school-leaving exams like Madhyamik and Higher Secondary as well as in undergraduate exams of Calcutta University.

The examinees generally do not give money. In most cases, those who write the letters plead for pass marks in a desperate attempt to get through the exam, Onkar Sadhan Adhikari, president, West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education, said.

Currency notes are found usually attached to answer scripts only in undergraduate exams held by Calcutta University. Noting this increasing tendency among the students, the university authorities have issued an instruction to examiners: that they should deposit the amount — no matter how small it is — with the university’s cash department.

Students writing university exams sometimes also write letters threatening the evaluators with dire consequences if they do not give them pass marks.

(with inputs from Mita Mukherjee in Calcutta)

[via Telegraph India]