Ensuring cheating-free online exam not easy for KU authorities

Nitish Sharma

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Tribune News Service

Kurukshetra, April 13

Ensuring cheating-free online examinations has become a challenging task for the Kurukshetra University authorities.

As per information, there have been incidents of student using cursive writing font in computer to attempt exam, impersonation, usage of books, and remaining off-camera for a longer period during the exam.

A professor said it was easy to catch students while cheating during offline examinations, but during online examination it gets very tough. Sometimes, it becomes difficult to identify the exact reason behind the student leaving the place while attempting the online exam for a few minutes. Besides this, poor net connectivity, data, and phone calls during examinations, as a majority of students are using phones to remain connected, are a few issues that the teachers and students face during the online examinations. There should be offline examinations, the teacher demanded.

As many as 10 cases of using unfair means have been reported so far during the ongoing examinations of the PG (first semester).

Not only the authorities, but a section of students is also concerned about this issue. A student said, “Students are also under stress. During online examinations, if anything goes wrong then the entire onus will be on the student. It has been observed that even the low performers of previous semesters are getting high marks, which also raises many questions.”

Dr Hukam Singh, Controller of Examinations, Kurukshetra University, said, “The exams of the first semesters are on. Some incidents of students using unfair means have been reported and we have been taking precautions accordingly. As many as 10 UMCs have been reported during the ongoing examinations, so far. We have asked the proctors to keep a close watch on the students and report if they find any student involved in cheating. We have been appointing centre superintendents for all arrangements. For better proctoring, we have been appointing one teacher per 20 students while earlier the number of students used to be 30-40. During the evaluation, some more cases may also come into notice.”

Brajesh Sawhney, director, public relations, Kurukshetra University, said, “Teachers keep a close watch on the students during proctoring through Google Meet. Sincere efforts are being made by the university to make examinations cheating free but if any student is caught by the teacher then appropriate action is taken against the student. At the same time, the teachers also help the students if they find any issue in uploading the answersheets or facing any technical issue.”