HC refuses to let CBSE tweak marks rule

Court directs CBSE to follow its ‘moderation policy’ of giving grace marks

The Delhi High Court on Tuesday ordered that the evaluation for the class 10 and 12 board tests this year will be done as per the grace marks policy that was in vogue when the students submitted the examination forms.

A bench of Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice Pratibha M. Singh refused to allow the CBSE to withdraw its moderation policy for the exams held this year, saying “rules cannot be changed after the game has begun”.

Under the moderation policy, grace marks are given to the students in exams for difficult questions or errors in the question paper. The court said the students who took the exams “ought to have been put to notice” as they have the “right to know” what the CBSE was doing.

“These children, who have worked so hard are entitled to some stability and the only stability they know is the system. Do not instill insecurity in them. Don’t do it (withdrawal of the policy) this year,” the bench said. “You cannot play with the future of students,” it said, adding “we are deeply concerned by the timing of the policy.”

The court said while the CBSE’s decision was “wonderful” as it was attempting to bring uniformity in the evaluation process to address the issue of “spiking” of marks, it “should have been done prospectively and uniformly for everyone across the country”.

The ruling assumes significance as some states, like Kerala and Tamil Nadu, have decided not to withdraw the moderation policy this year.

Another “distressing” factor was that the CBSE had “completely ignored” the fact that conditional admission had been offered to Indian students by foreign varsities on the basis of the evaluation policy in place while it decided to withdraw the moderation policy.