A total of 8,96,447 students from 15,881 high schools across Karnataka will appear for the first annual Secondary School Leaving Certificate (SSLC) exam beginning today (March 21).
Among them are 4,61,563 boys and 4,34,884 girls. To ensure a fair examination process and curb malpractice, the Karnataka State Examination and Assessment Board (KSEAB) will once again implement webstreaming for monitoring, stated a report by The New Indian Express.
On the first day, students will appear for first-language exams in Kannada, Telugu, Hindi, Marathi, Tamil, Urdu, English, and Sanskrit from 10 am to 1.15 pm across 2,818 examination centres.
Electronic devices such as mobile phones, smartwatches, and earphones are strictly prohibited inside examination centres. Officers and staff on examination and security duty are also banned from using mobile phones at the centres.
Only the chief of the examination centre is permitted to use a basic mobile phone without a camera.
KSRTC, Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC), and other transport corporations will offer free bus services for students on the day of the exam. Students can avail the service by showing their ID cards and admission tickets.
This year, students must score at least 35% to pass the SSLC examination, as the KSEAB has reverted to the pre-COVID evaluation system. Last year, the board had lowered the passing mark to 25% and added grace marks to help more students get promoted after a significant number failed the SSLC exam.
However, School Education Minister Madhu Bangarappa recently announced that such relaxations will no longer be in place. He attributed last year’s decline in results to new measures like web-casting, which led the board to temporarily reduce the qualifying marks, according to the report by The New Indian Express.
“That system will not exist anymore. There will be no grace marks, and the qualifying marks will remain at 35%,” the minister had recently clarified.
