Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Thursday strongly attacked Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi after the latter alleged that he had rigged the CBSE on-screen marking (OSM) system used to evaluate Class 12 board examination papers. He said the Congress MP was “frustrated” for making such allegations.
Rahul Gandhi claimed that CBSE failed to answer questions raised about alleged irregularities in the evaluation process.
Launching a scathing attack on Pradhan, Rahul asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to seek his resignation after the NEET-UG paper was leaked, which was followed by the CBSE controversy.
“There has been massive manipulation of CBSE exam results, leaving millions of children across the country and their parents in shock,” Gandhi wrote. He alleged that COEMPT, which was awarded the contract for the digital assessment process, was earlier operating under the name Globarena and was involved in the controversy in Telangana in 2019. “The name has changed, but the intent is the same, the nature is the same,” Gandhi said.
Read also | Detailed account of Rahul Gandhi and CBSE standoff over ‘massive rigging’ allegation
In response to Gandhi’s statements, CBSE issued a statement denying any wrongdoing in awarding the contract. “The CBSE rejects the allegations regarding award of contract to Coempt Edutech. They are false, misleading and not based on facts,” the board said.
Pradhan said that Rahul is feeling frustrated after suffering continuous electoral defeats and continues to raise baseless issues.
“The continuing electoral defeats have left Rahul Gandhi frustrated. He opposed SIR, EVMs and even Digital India, and distanced himself from India’s scientific progress… Right now, our priority is students. We must ensure that they do not suffer from any mental stress,” Pradhan said while talking to reporters on Thursday.
Read also | From being called ‘Pakistani’ to CBSE apology: Vedant Shrivastava case amid OSM row
What is CBSE OSM class?
Ever since the CBSE announced the Class 12 exam results, students have raised concerns over the OSM-based evaluation system used to evaluate the answer papers. CBSE used its new OSM system for digital assessment of Class 12 answer papers this year.
The problem escalated when Vedant Shrivastava, a student from Delhi, asked for scanned copies of his answer sheets on May 19 after getting what he described as “unexpectedly low marks” in physics.
After receiving the scanned copies on May 23, he realized that the physics answer sheet linked to his roll number did not belong to him.
He pointed out the problem in a post on X and uploaded side-by-side screenshots of his English and Computer Science papers to show that the handwriting in the physics text was different. CBSE acknowledged the mistake and provided him with the correct answer sheet, but not before the student was trolled online and even called a ‘Pakistani’ for simply raising the issue.
