Students may face prison for cheating

HYDERABAD: Students caught cheating in the matriculation exams in Telangana could land behind bars, with the state’s education department deciding to enforce a stringent law that has provisions for jail terms up to seven years, officials said on Wednesday.

Besides, schools found encouraging mass copying could have their affiliation to the state board withdrawn and officials jailed.

The directorate of school education, in recent guidelines, asked all district examiners, who will supervise the upcoming examinations, to enforce the Andhra Pradesh Education Act 1982 and the Andhra Pradesh Public Examinations (Prevention of Malpractices and Unfair Means) Act, 1997. The laws, enacted before bifurcation of Tel- angana from AP, have provisions for jail term ranging from three to seven years with fine ranging from ₹5,000 to ₹1 lakh for indulging in malpractices in exams.

Activists and lawyers, however, criticised the move. Andhra Pradesh child rights association president P Achyuta Rao said filing of criminal cases against students indulging in mass copying and prosecuting them would be a clear violation of the Juvenile Justice Act. “The Act does not permit penal action against children. Though mass copying is a criminal offence as per the malpractices Act, it does not apply to students below 16 years of age. They can’t be sent even to juvenile homes as they are not committing a serious crime like rape or murder ,” he said.

Director of school education G Kishan said they would invoke the jail provision against erring students only in “extreme cases”.