Action to be taken against officials: Himachal Education Minister

Education Minister Rohit Thakur today said action would be taken against officials responsible for the goof-up in the evaluation of Class XII English exam of the Himachal Pradesh Board of School Education. “Action will be taken as per the rules against the persons responsible for the mistake,” Thakur said here today. The Class XII English exam had to be postponed this year as the question paper was opened up by mistake a day ahead of the exam by an invigilator in one of the examination centres.

Later, while evaluating the answer sheet, the official concerned used the wrong answer key, resulting in the award of incorrect marks and re-evaluation of the answer sheets. Following the re-evaluation, the overall result increased by over 5 per cent.

Responding to the question of shortage of teachers in some several schools, the minister admitted that there was a shortage of teachers, especially TGT medical and non-medical, in districts like Shimla and Sirmaur and the government was trying to address it through recruitment and rationalisation.

“We have around 3,100 posts pending with Rajya Chayan Ayog. Out of these, around 400 are of TGT medical and non-medical stream,” he said. The minister further said that the government was keen on rationalisation of resources. “The pupil-teacher ratio in district Lahaul and Spiti is 3:1, in Kinnaur it’s 7:1. Through rationalisation and recruitment, we are trying to address this issue,” he said.