MUMBAI: The political slugfest is continued over conducting the final year students of the university examinations. Maharashtra government has expressed its inability to conduct these exams in the month of September as per the University Grants Commission (UGC) decision.
Higher and technical education minister Uday Samant had a meeting with the university vice-chancellors on Thursday where they decided to cancel the final year exams. "I spoke with many experts and doctors who suggested not conducting any exams so far. The pandemic situation is not yet over. We should not put the lives of students in danger," Samant said adding that he has conveyed this message to UGC after its decision of conducting exams.
Samant said that the students are not also mentally prepared to give the exams so there is no point by the central government to force them. He said that Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Rajasthan etc have also decided to cancel the final year university exams. "The UGC should decide the methodology to calculate the mark on the basis of the previous records of particular students. Government has already acquired the colleges and hostel premises and turned them into either quarantine centre or COVID care centre," Samant said.
Besides, students who were staying in hotels were gone back to native places. And, in lockdown, no one is allowed to travel one place to another and there is also a transport facility issue. It will not be appropriate to put the student and teacher lives in danger but whoever is connected to exams will face the health issue," he said.
Samant said that those students had ATKT, the UGC should give the grace mark and end this controversy for once and all. "There is no point keeping students in confusion. Government and UGC should take the holistic approach and take the final decision in favour of students," minister said.
Meanwhile, Shiv Sena’s youth branch Yuva Sena has started the online petition to cancel the final year university exams. Party youth leader Varun Sardesai tweeted that, “ In less than 24 hours we have got 1,50,000+ signatures on our petition!! Keep sharing, keep spreading! Let's make our voice heard. Wakeup @ugc_india!. He further tweeted that, 32 Karnataka Students Who Wrote SSLC Exam Test Positive. Karnataka is a BJP ruled state and yet BJP wants to put crores of Students and Education staff at risk! Mind Baffling! Why???.