In the context of the NEET controversy, it is very easy to get all sanctimonious about the manner in which so many students in Bihar, particularly, cheat to pass their school board exams. Their desperation and that of their family members is so great that young men risk life and limb to get ‘chits’ across to the examinees.
It is very easy to say that students would not have to do all this if they took the trouble to study through the year. So, why don’t they? It would certainly be easier than all the last-minute heroics.
This has to do with the class of people they come from, which inhabits small towns and rural areas. Many of the children live in a way that, first, they have little time to study – particularly girls. Their families do not have the educational background to provide the support that is naturally available to better off people. Things are made worse by a curriculum that does not connect in any way with their lives. Children actually pass exams by rote-learning right up to class twelve and, yet, have no clue about what they have ‘studied’. So, what is the difference between mugging the answers and using cheat sheets? And, of course, they are let down by their teachers, who are not just overwhelmed by the sheer number of students, but also have to teach students from scratch without help from parents and others.
The sad fact is that, if a student wishes to upgrade to a better level of education, such as a degree college, the class twelve exams have to be passed, no matter what. In a country where even people with PhDs apply for peons’ jobs, getting the ‘basic’ degrees is an absolute must for social mobility. Otherwise, they have very little going for them. The importance that Bihari culture gives to degrees and government jobs increases the pressure on the children.
Of course, it might be thought that the children who take the trouble to study and take their exams face unfair competition, but it is a fact that those checking the papers can make out the difference.
Clamping down on cheating will result in around forty percent of children failing their exams. Such results might force the system to introduce reform, but what about the large numbers left by the wayside in the meanwhile? One immediate step that can be taken, particularly in Uttarakhand where children face similar difficulties, is to set the papers in a way that some questions allow the children to get pass marks easily, but raise the mark in the remaining ones so that the truly meritorious students can score higher. The questions have also to be prepared in a way that actual learning is checked, instead of just the answers learned by heart.
It is no wonder that students who have emerged from such a system want even important examinations like the Civil Services to be dumbed down to match their levels. If job related recruitment is done on the basis of the actual skills required, the pressure on the students would lessen and, perhaps, the necessary reform introduced.
