Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has asked officials to invoke the National Security Act (NSA) against those involved in unfair practices in the upcoming UP Board Class 10 and Class 12 exams beginning February 16. Apart from this, FIRs will also be registered. Against room invigilators and center administrators found involved in fraudulent activities. According to the official spokesperson, the Chief Minister has ordered the officers that static and sector magistrates should be appointed at each examination center by the District Magistrates. Last year, the board had to face a major embarrassment after the Class 12 English language question paper was leaked in 24 districts.
The spokesperson said, “They will have to report to the District Inspector of Schools along with the District Magistrate after the examination is over so that daily activities can be monitored. On the other hand, for the first time a separate room will be made. “For monitoring the examination, a separate room has been made from the principal’s room.”
Besides this, the copies will be kept in a double locked almirah and a CCTV camera will be installed to monitor it round the clock.
After the appointment of room inspectors in all the districts, they will be given rigorous training before the examination. Training will also be given to sector and static magistrates, center administrators and external center administrators in the district.
Yogi Adityanath has directed that a separate strong room be set up for the security of question papers, with 24-hour deployment of two armed policemen with CCTV surveillance.
He also called for installation of voice-enabled CCTVs, digital voice recorders, router devices and high-speed broadband connections at the examination centres.
“Strict action should be taken against anyone found to be absent during this period,” the guidelines said. In such a situation, the permission of the District Magistrate or the Additional District Magistrate will be necessary while opening the question paper.
This year, a total of 58,85,745 students, including 31,16,487 for class 10 and 27,69,258 for class 12, have registered for the high school and intermediate examinations.
UP Board Secretary Divyakant Shukla told that out of total students, 32,46,780 are male and 26,38,965 are female candidates.
He said that these candidates would appear in 8,753 examination centers including 540 government, 3,523 private and 4,690 unaided colleges spread across the state.
Also, 170 candidates who are prisoners lodged in various jails have also registered for the exam. Of them, 91 have registered to appear for the 12th examination, while 79 have registered for the 10th examination.
Meanwhile, a total of 936 exam centers have been identified as sensitive while another 242 centers have been declared hypersensitive by the board.
Live monitoring through webcasting has also been arranged.
Apart from this, STF and Local Intelligence Unit (LIU) of UP Police have also been deployed to monitor sensitive and hyper-sensitive exam centres.