Post leak, CBSE mulls encrypted question papers
New Delhi, July 18
The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is considering using encrypted question papers for Class X and XII examinations and passing on the task of printing them to schools from next year. The move is being currently tested as a pilot project in the ongoing compartmental examinations after the Board had to face embarrassment following question paper leaks in March this year.
The CBSE is also planning to provide logistical support to examination centres that lack adequate printing and xerox machines. “We are testing this on pilot basis during the compartment exams where question papers are being delivered via e-mails 30 minutes ahead of the exam. The passwords are sent separately to the centre superintendent and the question papers are printed and photocopied at the centres,” CBSE secretary Anurag Tripathi said. “We are only going to select big schools as centres which have adequate infrastructure. For those lacking it, we will hire an agency to provide the logistical support. The printing cost will be borne by the CBSE. There is not going to be a major difference in the expenditure in the current process and the proposed one,” he added.
However, a final decision in this regard will be taken soon after an analysis of the pilot run as well as the logistical demands, Tripathi said.
“Another possibility we are looking at is to start at a lower scale of sending encrypted question papers where the number of students are low. It all depends on how prepared we are with the logistics,” he said. According to CBSE, a centre with around 500 students will need to print 8,000 pages of question papers in one subject.
“The logistics needed for that is printers, internet, photocopiers, uninterrupted power supply or power backup. There are 1200 KVs and 600 Navodaya Vidyalayas, which are complete with the infrastructure. CBSE needs around 4,500 centres, but in this system the number of centres may decrease marginally. We will look for centres which have higher capacity and the necessary logistics first. This may bring down the number of centres, but we will ensure that students don’t face any difficulty,” Tripathi said. — PTI
