Noida girl first, just short of perfect 100

New Delhi, May 28

Talented keyboard player Raksha Gopal struck all the right chords and ended up today with the highest score of 99.6 per cent marks in the Class XII examination conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) this year.

Raksha, a humanities student at Amity International School, Noida, said she was expecting a “good” result but was surprised to find that she was just short of a perfect 100 — by a mere two marks.

(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)

Raksha, who stood first among almost 11 lakh students across India, scored cent per cent marks in English core, political science and economics, and 99 per cent in psychology and history.

With 99.4 per cent marks, Chandigarh’s Bhoomi Sawant, a science student, scored the second highest marks. Mannat Luthra, also from Chandigarh, and Aditya Jain from Panchkula — both from Bhavan Vidyalaya in Chandigarh — jointly bagged the third rank with 99.2 per cent in the commerce stream.

Sawant, a student of DAV School in Sector 8, scored 100 in physics, chemistry, mathematics and computer science and 97 in English.

HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar spoke to the toppers and congratulated them. The all-India pass percentage has gone down from 83.05 per cent to 82 this year. The board has also started a helpline with toll free number 18000118004 for psychological counselling post the results between 8 am and 10 pm.

Aiming to check high cut-offs in colleges, the CBSE had scrapped the moderation policy under which grace marks are given to students for difficult questions. However, following intervention of the Delhi High Court, the board decided to implement the change from next year.

According to CBSE, a total of 87.5 per cent girls passed the exams compared with 78 per cent boys. While 10,091 students scored more than 95 per cent marks, 63,247 got more than 90. — Agencies