Last year’s paper ‘leaked’ on social media as 9.34 lakh appear for REET No writing assistant, visually challenged man turned away
‘Leaked paper’ reached aspirants at 9.50am. Officials crosschecked it with new test paper at 10am before declaring that leaked paper was of last year
BARMER/UDAIPUR/ALWAR: More than 9.34 lakh candidate appeared for the Rajasthan Eligibility Examination for Teachers (REET) – 2018, that was conducted across Rajasthan on Sunday.
The examination was conducted in two parts, while the level-2 exams were held from 10am to 12.30 pm at 2,253 centres across the state, the level-1 exams were held between 2.30 pm and 5 pm at 529.
Of the 8.04 lakh candidates who registered for the level-1 exams, only 7.43 lakh wrote the exams. In the level-2 exams, more than 1.91 lakh out of the 2.08 lakh registered candidates wrote the exams.
As soon as the first part of the exam started, rumours started doing the rounds that the exam paper along with the answer key had been leaked on social media.
Candidates who got hold of the “leaked papers”, and who did not wished to be named, shared the papers shared it with HT.
The rumours, however, were soon put to rest by the exam officials who said that it was on old paper.
Vasudev Devnani, state education minister, who took stock of the exam arrangements at the Board of Secondary Education, Rajasthan in Ajmer, said: “A paper went viral at 9.50 in the morning. When the exam papers were opened at 10 am and matched with the leaked one, it was found that it was an old paper from 2013 and has no connection with this year’s paper.”
Meanwhile, police detained two persons in Alwar for using unfair means in the exams. One was using a Bluetooth device during the exams while the other was impersonating a candidate, police said.
Earlier in the week, chief secretary Nihal Chand Goel issued instructions to district officials through video conferencing that no cheating takes place and the secrecy of exams is not compromised at any level.
More than 10,000 CCTV cameras were also installed across the centres and were constantly monitored at the control room set up at the BSER, an official said. Jammers were also set up at the exam centres and internet services were also suspended around the centres in some areas, the official said.
The conducting the REET was a big challenge considering the incidents of paper leaks during previous exams, but the board overcame the challenge with the help of the state government, education department and police, said Prof BL Choudhary, chairman of BSER. BHARATPUR : An exam centre in Bharatpur refused a visually challenged candidate to take the Rajasthan Eligibility Examination for Teachers (REET) as he did not have an amanuensis, a writing assistant, with him.
REET was conducted at centres across the state on Sunday.
Mohammad Nasir, the candidate, said that he was turned out as he did not have a writing assistant with him. “The centre, too, refused to provide one,” said Nasir, a research scholar of history at Aligarh Muslim University.
BP Srivastava, principal, Bharatpur Homoeopathic College, said that Nasir was not given an amanuensis as he did not inform the centre two days in advance. According to exam rules, a visually challenged candidate should inform the centre about the requirement for a writing assistant two days before the test.
“There were no instructions about informing the centre beforehand on the admit card,” said Nasir, who came to Bharatpur, with three other visually challenged candidates from Aligarh.
The three were able to sit for the exam as their respective centres provided them with writing assistants.
One among them, Danish Naseem, said that his exam centre provided him a writing hand without any hassle. “The exam centre is responsible for providing an amanuensis to the visually challenged candidate,” said Bavita Sharma, principal of Aravali Secondary School.
OP Jain, additional district collector and nodal officer of REET, said that visually challenged candidates need to communicate the requirement for an amanuensis two days before the exam. “All instructions are given on the website of Board of Secondary Education, Rajasthan,” he added.