KARACHI, Feb 20: The Board of Intermediate Education, Karachi, has decided to approach the Sindh Education Department on the issue of students’ attendance report, sources in the Board said on Wednesday.

It was learnt that despite repeated requests and warnings, about 15 colleges and higher secondary schools in the public sector had not submitted attendance reports, which were supposed to reach at the office of the Executive District Officer (education) and the BIE every month.

Till February 8 there were about 30 educational institutions, including federal govt colleges and private institutions, which never bothered to submit the attendance report despite a clearcut decision of the Education Department.

The sources said the Board was acting in line with the directives of the education department and Sindh cabinet’s decision regarding 75 per cent mandatory attendance of students during an academic year, which would qualify a candidate for appearing in the BIE annual examinations commencing from April 15.

However, the attitude of the colleges was not positive in a number of cases, while the education department was also failing to get compliance of its orders, added the source, saying that only an immediate response from the college principals and the education department would enable the BIE to process the examination forms.

Some of the colleges which have not sent any attendance reports had also submitted examination forms of their students, which have been kept in abeyance, as the BIE had not received the routine attendance report, a source of data that could be considered valid for any cross check, said the source.

Apart from the defaulting 15 government institutions, other colleges and higher secondary schools have also submitted examination forms of the students who had been able to attend 50 per cent of classes till Jan 31, 2001.

The BIE has not accepted such forms which were not certified by the college principals.

On the other hand college principals are also in a fix as they don’t know how to deal with the students who failed to attain the required 50 per cent attendance by the end of January, added the sources, claiming that in many colleges the defaulting students have not been informed about their fate, as there were chances of hostile reaction at the colleges.

College sources maintained that if the BIE was allowed to withhold examination forms of students, while restricting to its rules, there were chances that about 20,000 students would not be able to appear in annual examinations 2002.

It was further learnt that the Board, which is reconciling the attendance certificates issued by college principals with the attendance reports received earlier, had also detected some cases which did not fulfil even the criteria of 50 per cent attendance.

The Board is likely to conclude the scrutiny of attendance records within a week.