CBSE gets Supreme Court's nod to cancel board exams, students can write optional exam to improve scores

The Supreme Court on Friday permitted the Centre and the CBSE to cancel the remaining class X and XII board examinations due to COVID-19 pandemic and gave a go-ahead to its scheme to award marks to students for the cancelled papers scheduled to be held in July. At the same time, the CBSE Exam Controller Sanyam Bhadrwaj said that the Class XII students will have an option to attempt the exams to improve their scores. 

"If class XII students appear for optional exams, marks obtained in it will be treated as their final score," he said. However, there is no clarity on when these exams will be held or if they will be online or offline. Also, X graders do not have this option. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre and the CBSE, said that the assessment scheme will consider marks achieved by students in last three papers of board exams. Both CBSE and ICSE told the top court that the results of the class X and XII board exams can be declared by mid of July.
 
The top court was hearing pleas seeking relief, including scrapping of remaining exams of Class 12 scheduled from July 1-15, in view of increasing number of COVID-19 cases. In April, the CBSE had notified about the remaining examinations stating it will be conducted for only 29 papers and the rest would be cancelled. The schedule for the remaining examinations was announced in May.
The announcement of the CBSE exams being scrapped is also likely to impact the admission process of all central universities as well as the national entrance exams including JEE Main and NEET 2020.