On Thursday, the Supreme Court said that the Andhra Pradesh government will be responsible “if there would be even one fatality” as a result of holding in-session Class 12 board exams next month.
The hearing was heard by a two-member bench of Justice AM Khanwilkar and Justice Dinesh Maheshwari. The two-member bench on Thursday said, “If there is even one fatality we may order compensation amounting to ₹ 1 crore when other boards had canceled, why does Andhra Pradesh want to show it is different?”
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The SC asked the state that why it is necessary to hold classroom exams when there were new and aggressive variants of Covid-19 in circulation. The court added, “There are states giving ₹ 1 crore as compensation to families of those who died. We may keep this amount for Andhra Pradesh also.”
The court further asked, “Other boards took a conscious decision based on the ground reality. There is a new variant - 'delta plus'. Nobody is clear how it will affect us... Who decided to hold these exams and what are the parameters on which the decision was taken?”
"It is a question of the health of everybody... not only about conducting exams. We are not convinced about your plan," the court declared.
Today, the court was hearing a plea to cancel Class 12 board exams in the state. The hearing would now continue tomorrow.
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An affidavit was submitted by the Andhra Pradesh government on Wednesday and the affidavit also mentioned details such as several rooms available to hold the exams. It said 15 to 18 students would be seated in a room to ensure social distancing protocols are followed.
"There is an issue in your affidavit you said students will be divided - 15 to 18 students in one room. Have you worked out the number of rooms needed? You require 34,634 rooms, where will you get so many rooms? Are you going to have exams in the open?" the unconvinced court asked today.
In return, the state said that there are around 34,000 rooms and around 50,000 teaching and non-teaching staff have been vaccinated and these all are ready to conduct the examination.
This time, in Andhra Pradesh more than 5 lakh students would be appearing for the Class 12th exams.
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Earlier, the Central Board (CBSE) and CISCE have canceled the Class 12 board exams. 21 states have also canceled class 12 board exams because of the pandemic. On Tuesday, the Andhra Pradesh government has said that it would conduct the class 12th Exam as the situation has been improving.