Dr Asangba Tzüdir
The current pandemic, of all sections of people, have left the student fraternity high and dry. While many students have to go through the physical and mental ‘ordeal’ of sitting through lengthy online classes, the final year graduating students have been kept simultaneously in both light and dark in the process of scheduling, cancelling, postponing and rescheduling of the exams.
Following the HRD ministry’s decision to go ahead with the final year exams in Universities, and also the UGC’s guidelines for conducting the exams, students across the country have been protesting against the move through online campaigns. The Nagaland Unit of the National Students Union of India (NSUI) too joined the online campaign with the hashtag trend #StudentsLivesMatter while at the same time calling for State Government’s intervention citing the various issues and problems adding that “Students are not testing kits.”
Among the problems highlighted, the question that poses a dilemma is the slogan that #StudentsLivesMatters, which has become more paramount in the face of rising number of cases in the state. To make matters worse, positive cases have been detected outside of quarantine centres, and it has been some time now that we have seen the need to now live with Corona Virus as much as we need to adopt precautionary measures.
Pitted against the question of life being at stake, the UGC has highlighted the need for academic prudence while maintaining credibility. The UGC in its 6 July circular notified that institutions and universities will conduct their final exams by the end of September which can be either in offline, online or even blended mode. Following this directive, some students have even gone to the extent of approaching the Apex Court against the decision. The Supreme Court has sought UGC’s reply on petitions to cancel final-year exams, wherein the Solicitor General Tushar Metha representing the UGC submitted before the Supreme Court that the response will be filed by July 29. The Apex Court has fixed the hearing on July 31 and will be interesting to see the outcome.
While students from 13 States including a Union Territory have sought cancellation of the exams, the UGC has submitted that out of 818 Universities, 209 have already conducted examinations while 394 are planning to conduct either in August or September with the blended mode. This in itself raises the question of uniformity, not to mention the evenly poised rational contestations.
By now the NU students must be tired to waiting in the dark since April, and if not for a semester reschedule, the other semester exams is normally conducted in October and which stands as of now unless there is a postponement necessitated by the current situation. While a final call from the SC and UGC is awaited, the current pandemic is unpredictable and therefore the time is now to give a final decision on whether the final exams should be cancelled or held so that the current semester is not jammed, that, a further postponement beyond September seems both undesirable and unrealistic considering the uncertainty of the situation.
Rather than not having at all, and being graded without conducting exam, the final examination can still he held in a blended (online+offline) form though in a different format like an open book exam or in a reduced format and online submission of the scripts. Alternative arrangements can be made for exceptional cases, even for submission of their answer scripts.
If we are to move ahead with the challenging times we have to move ahead by crawling through various available alternatives if it is not possible to walk or run.
(Dr. Asangba Tzudir contributes a weekly guest editorial to the Morung Express. Comments can be emailed to asangtz@gmail.com)
