Read Time: 05 minutes

In view of the Covid-19 pandemic's effect on students across the country, the Supreme Court on Monday agreed for urgent listing of plea seeking an alternate mode of assessment of students from Class X, XI, and XII of CBSE, ICSE, NIOS, and State Boards instead of an offline exam.

Chief Justice of India NV Ramana has directed the matter to be listed before Justice AM Khanwilkar considering the urgent listing request mentioned by Advocate Prashant Padmanabhan.

The petition has been filed by Anubha Shrivastava Sahai a child rights activist and Student Union of Odisha after several students from different boards approached the petitioners raising the said grievance. 

The plea states that "In most of the States during the lockdown period of June - December 2020 no classes were provided to Students. Almost 98% of colleges/schools of all the States had not conducted any online class for Students in that period."

However, it is alleged that looking into the matter most of the State Government & Education department has declared for 100 days offline class for students and will conduct exams after100 days offline classes.

The plea adds that "the government said the students have to bring “No Objection Certificate” signed by parents to join offline classes. But most of the parents were unable to allow their child for offline classes in the pandemic. Also, it is said that it is not compulsory for all students to join offline classes.

The petitioners have also asserted that "in addition to this, family members of several students were in hospitals during the period, lost their family members, faced other difficulties, all this has impacted the studies of many students and especially of those who could not afford tuition."

"Some states have declared the timetable for the final exam in offline mode in subjective form some have still not declared and in 5 states due to elections they haven’t decided anything," the plea further adds. 

It is in this regard the petitioners have sought an alternate mode of assessment of students from Class X XI XII of CBSE, ICSE, NIOS and State Boards instead of offline exam and to conduct an improvement exam for those who are not satisfied with internal assessment and further direction to constitute a committee to decide the formula of assessment of students including compartment students and declare the result within a time limit and deadline.

Case Title: Anubha Shrivastava Sahai and Anr Vs. Union of India & Ors.