SSC, HSC exams to be held offline only

Aurangabad, Feb 2:

The Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education (MSBSHSE) will conduct SSC and HSC practical and theory examinations offline as per the schedule announced. The State Board is firm on the offline examination as it has fixed chief centres and will distribute materials required for the practical examinations from February 11.

R P Patil , the Divisional Secretary of MSBSHSE, confirmed this information. The practical examination for class X will be conducted between February 25 and March 14, while the written examination will be held from March 15 to April 4. He said that the list of district wise counsellors for class students, helpline number will be issued to clear doubts of the examinees.

The HSC students will appear for the practical examination from February 14 to March 4 and the written examinations commence on March 4 and end on March 30. Hundreds of students across the State took to the streets demanding to postpone the examination or take it online. The State Education Board organised an online meeting with the divisional boards on Wednesday regarding the examination.

In this meeting, it was cleared that the 10th and 12th examinations would be given as per schedule. The written examination will be conducted on the basis of 75 per cent syllabus while the practical test based on 40 per cent of the syllabus. This has reduced confusion created by agitation.

Around 1.81 lakh SSC students will take the examinations at 626 centres in Aurangabad, Jalna, Parbhani, Beed and Hingoli while for HSC there are 1.65 lakh candidates and 408 centres.

For this, the appointment of examiners has been completed and additional centres are being prepared.

According to the Divisional Board officers, the district education department is in the process of organising online pre-preparation meetings of the centres.

Education officer M K Deshmukh said that the education department is collecting information about the available facilities from the schools as preparations for the home centres if the situation demands in the coming days.