KARACHI, March 1: About 20 per cent of the students aspiring to appear in the SSC annual examinations-2002 on Friday could not take the examinations.
Despite all the hue and cry, a good number of candidates, including the failures of the last examinations, could not be delivered admit cards till late on Thursday night, added the source.
Though the Board of Secondary Education, Karachi, had announced late on Thursday night that those who could not get admit cards by Thursday would be given another chance for siting in the examination. A number of candidates visited the BSE offices on Friday morning as well for the cards.
The quarters concerned had been critical of the BSE’s workings for the last many days, particularly with respect to examinations where it lacks the required manpower. They had expressed the apprehension that the education board would not be able to go with the examination schedule smoothly.
After being told by schools that the BSE had not delivered admit cards for distribution among candidates, the students started visiting the BSE offices and on Thursday. They turned rowdy on not getting their admit cards and ransacked the BSE’s examination section.
BSE officials maintain that the problem arose out of schools’ failure to send their representatives with authority letters to get admit cards.
The examinations of Sindhi (easy course), Sindhi (normal), Geography of Pakistan and Urdu (alternate) were held for the failures of classes IX and X. A senior official at the Board said that the examinations were held at all the centres peacefully.
According to the BSE schedule of examinations, during the first five days of March papers for over 10000 failures of the previous examinations would be conducted, while the major papers for regular and fresh candidates of classes IX and X would start from March 6 for the general group and from March 7 for the science group.
The BSE official once again maintained on Friday that students who had already submitted their examination forms would not be deprived of the opportunity to appear in the examination.
The official added that those who had missed the examination on Friday or were likely to miss the examinations in the coming days only for want of admit cards would be provided with all the opportunities to appear in examination this year.
It was further said that the failure of previous examinations who had submitted their examination forms on March 26 and 28 would get their cards at their given addresses soon.
BSE delivered admit cards to some more schools on Friday morning for further distribution among candidates, informed the BSE sources.
DEMO: A small group of students staged a protest demonstration at the Governor’s House, adds PPI
They urged the governor to take action against the Board authorities.
The protesters tried to present a memorandum to the governor, but after being refused dispersed peacefully.
Meanwhile, Islami Jamiat Talaba has critisized the Board for failing to issue admit cards to students and demanded the government to take action against the Board authorities.
In a statement on Friday, an IJT spokesman demanded the governor to resolve the issue.