The Madhya Pradesh Board of Secondary Education has postponed the examinations of Classes 10 and 12 in view of a spike in COVID-19 cases, an official said on Wednesday.

The exams of the high school, higher secondary and diploma in pre-school education (vocational course) were scheduled to begin from April 30 and May 1. Now, the exams are likely to be conducted from the first week of June and the board will soon issue a new amended schedule, a spokesperson of the state board said.

The MP government has declared summer holidays for students of Classes 1 to 8 from April 15 to June 13 keeping in mind the safety and health of students, state School Education Minister Indar Singh Parmar said. On Tuesday, Madhya Pradesh recorded 8,998 new cases of coronavirus, the biggest single-day spike in the state since outbreak of COVID-19 in March last year, pushing the infection count to 3,53,632.

The COVID-19 fatality count rose to 4,261 with 40 more deaths reported on Tuesday. This month, the state has so far reported 58,121 new cases of COVID-19 and 275 deaths due to the disease, as per official data.