At last, the Andhra Pradesh government on Thursday evening announced cancellation of Class 10 and Intermediate second year (Class 12) examinations in the state keeping in view the Coronavirus pandemic.
A decision to this effect was taken by chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy at a high-level meeting of the education department officials at his camp office in Amaravati in the evening.
The decision comes within hours of the Supreme Court bench expressing its dissatisfaction over the adamant stand of the state government in deciding to conduct the examinations in the last week of July, while many states in the country.
The apex court said it was convinced by the arguments of the state government mentioned in its affidavit stating that it would conduct the exams physically by taking all precautions in view of the Covid-19 pandemic, such as accommodating only 15 students in each examination hall.
The court wondered whether the state government had arranged more than 30,000 examination halls to conduct the examinations.
It also observed that the pandemic situation is very uncertain and no one can predict what could happen during the last week of July.
The bench referred to the apprehensions raised by experts about the possible third wave and the delta variant of coronavirus.
After the meeting with Jagan, state education minister Adimulapu Suresh told reporters that the government had decided to cancel the examinations for SSC and Intermediate students, following the suggestions from the Supreme Court.
“Since 18 states have cancelled the examinations and are getting ready for admissions into higher classes, the court suggested that AP should not lag behind. It also ordered that all the states should declare the examination results by July 31, which is impossible in our state. So, we have decided to cancel the SSC and Intermediate examinations,” he said.
He announced that the government would appoint a high-power committee to look into the announcement of results and awarding of marks to the students at the earliest.
