The Congress on Monday stepped up its criticism of the Centre over the rollout of the CBSE’s On-Screen Marking System (OSM) for Class 12 Board examinations, accusing the government of mishandling the evaluation process and putting the future of lakhs of students at risk.
Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh alleged that the newly introduced digital assessment mechanism had resulted in confusion, irregularities, and widespread distress among students and parents across the country. In a sharp statement, he described the situation as evidence of a “total institutional collapse” under the present administration.
According to Ramesh, the pass percentage in the CBSE Class 12 examinations dropped from 88 per cent to 85 per cent after the implementation of the OSM system — a decline he termed unprecedented. He claimed that students and evaluators had encountered several technical and procedural problems, including blurred answer sheets, incorrect allocation of scripts, inaccurate marking, delays in payments to teachers, and steep revaluation fees.
“The CBSE introduced an On-Screen Marking System for Grade 12 Board Examinations, which has thrown into chaos the academic futures of lakhs of children across the country,” he said.
Ramesh also took aim at union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, questioning why the government had failed to adequately prepare for the transition to the digital marking process. He criticised the minister for reacting only after complaints mounted from students, parents, and teachers over the past several days.
“Now the Education Minister, who is presiding over total institutional collapse, has finally woken up to this tragedy, more than a week after it first came to light,” Ramesh remarked while referring to reports that experts from Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur had been called in to address the technical shortcomings.
“He’s portraying himself as some saviour by bringing in IIT Kanpur to help address these technical issues. The question really is, why were these issues not anticipated? Why did the CBSE and the Ministry not plan carefully before adopting this OSM system? Why did it take the Minister so long to respond to this issue?” he asked.
Escalating the political attack, the Congress leader demanded the resignation of the Education Minister and sought accountability from Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the controversy.
“The Mantri Pradhan owes the country his resignation, and the Pradhan Mantri owes us answers to why this Minister — who is openly disrupting the future of India’s students with his ineptitude — has been allowed to continue for so long,” Ramesh said.
The controversy over the OSM system has sparked concern in several states, with students and parents reporting discrepancies in evaluation and difficulties linked to the digital scanning of answer sheets. The CBSE had introduced the technology-driven system as part of its broader push to modernise examination assessment and streamline the evaluation process.
