NATIONAL7Spotlight Weekly)]

The Cheating Business

Rampant cheating during the high school exams, mostly in the outlying districts, questions the credibility of what used to be known as the iron gate

BY A CORRESPONDENT

The police personnel deployed at different School Leaving Certificate exam centers in Dhanusha District had tough time to execute their responsibilities last Friday -- the first day of the high school exams this year. For the law enforcers, the troubles were not the examinees inside the exam halls. What were pestering the cops were increasing number of guardians and parents of the examinees thronging the exam centersí premises.

The guardians were all out to pass the chits to their wards in the exam hall while the police personnel had tough time to bring the situation under control. Reason: The number of such guardians had far more exceeded the number of police personnel.

And that was not all. The police had to helplessly witness scenes like this: Increasing number of guardians were swimming across a pond to pass the chits to exam taking students at Janaki High School in Janakpur -- headquarters of Dhanusha District.

According to the explanation of police personnel in Janakpur, the guardians were seen swimming while holding long bamboo with chits at their upper end in a bid to reach the student taking exams. "This kind of way to help students cheat has been seen for the first time," senior police personnel in the district headquarters were quoted as saying by daily newspapers.

As if that were not enough, teachers in an exam center at Laxmania Bazaar in Dhanusha District themselves were involved in preparing chits. According to locals, the teachers would pass the chits to the guardians who would pay Rupees 100 each.

According to news items carried by different dailies, different ways were taken up by the guardians to help students cheat. More than the public schools, private schools were found to have arranged "good" network for cheating. The entire district was abuzz with the news that the private schools had bribed the officials of the District Education Office in Dhanusha.

The "evil deed" did not confine to Dhanusha alone. Equally disturbing news trickled in from Rautahat -- another Tarai District. Students from different districts are said to have reached Rautahat last week to take the SLC exams. Many students, according to a report, enrolled themselves in Jungle Saiya High School in Rautahat few months before the SLC exams began.

"We have paid our teachers around 7,000 Rupees extra and they have been helping us to copy from our course books, guide books at our exam centers," said Shiva Bahdur Nepal of Kathmandu who has failed the SLC exams several times in the past.

Another candidate Dinesh Thapa from Hetaunda joined the same school as he was assured to be supplied with chits during the exams. "We have no problems while cheating since the invigilators help us to do so. They even warn us in advance when someone from outside the exam center arrived nearby our exam halls."

Locals point at outsiders who arrive here to take the SLC exams as the main culprit. "The outsiders offer hefty sum to teachers and invigilators and that is how things go haywire," they say. Ram Nivasi Thakur, District Education Officer in Gaur, told a daily that he was freshly appointed in his present post in Rautahat and so he needed time to asses the situation.

With cheating having become the rule of the day in different SLC exam centers across the Kingdom, observers have already begun to question the credibility of what used to be known as the iron gate. "When students can get across the exams by the means of cheating, what is the use of holding exams?" they ask.

Officials in the Controller of SLC Examinations Headquarters in the capital have differing views. Some blame at the national education system while others point their fingers at the lack of the vision in the leaders. "The blame has to be shared by politicians, planners, teachers and even the parents and guardians," said a senior controller requesting anonymity.

A total of 240,628 students from 3,809 schools across the Kingdom have appeared in the SLC examinations this year. Of the total number, 206,706 are regular students while 33,922 are exempted.