Cheating exposes poor measures for matric exams across Sindh

As the 2019 secondary school certificate annual examinations, commonly known as matriculation examinations, began in Karachi and the rest of Sindh on Monday, officials of the Board of Secondary Education Karachi (BSEK) caught six fake candidates red-handed who attempted to take the exam instead of real candidates.

According to an official statement issued by the matric board on Monday, the cases of defaulter candidates have been referred to the board’s judicious committee to investigate the cases and make a plan to fully eradicate cheating culture in the examination.

If the committee found the real candidates guilty of sending someone else in lieu of themselves to take the exams, the board officials have the option to punish them by banning them from appearing in the matriculation exams for two years, read the statement.

A total of 367,606 students in the city are taking their ninth and 10th grade examinationsorganised by the BSEK. Of them, the students of ninth grade are 158,680. The board has set up around 365 exams centres across the city, of which 202 centers have been established in private schools while 163 centres have been set up at government schools.

“There was no case of any report of outsiders interrupting the invigilation process,” said BSEK Chairman Prof Dr Saeeduddin. He maintained that he personally visited around 10 examination centres where all the examiners were following the board’s instructions.

Prof Saeeduddin, however, stated that some students of a private school had staged a protest demonstration because their admit cards were not issued by the board officials as the school administration had not submitted their examination fees to the board.

“When I came to know about it, I directed the relevant department to issue admit cards to those protesting students. I also allowed those candidates to appear in the examinations because it's the basic responsibility of the BSEK to facilitate examinees,” the BSEK chairman said.

He claimed that this year the board official had taken measures to stop cheating during the examinations which used to be committed with full impunity in the past. All the BSEK officials are committed to conduct free and transparent examinations this year, he asserted.