Examination goof-ups continue to haunt Mumbai University students

“Initially, there was chaos as students got worried. However, we spoke to the varsity authorities and accommodated them in our college. The exam went well. It was just a miscommunication where we were not informed about these last-minute changes. University conducts hundreds of exams at a time, and such small things are bound to happen,” said Ajit Singh, principal of the college.

Over the past few years, students have faced problems with every new assessment process introduced by the varsity. This year, MU declared the engineering results on March 19, 80-90 days from the conclusion of the exams, instead of 45 days as stipulated. When students received their marksheets on Saturday, a large number of first year students found they had been marked failed and final year students were marked absent in exams they appeared for, and therefore failed those exams.

According to varsity authorities, the error occurred to the due the On Screen Marking (OSM) online assessment system, which was introduced in all branches of engineering this year. They claimed that many answer sheets and papers could not be scanned properly and were missed out. “The matter is not as serious as is being made out to be. The issue occurred in the case of a few students and we are rectifying it. We have asked the colleges to inform us if any of their students is facing a similar problem,” Dr Naresh Chandra, pro-vice chancellor of MU.

Some college principals alleged that 10-12 students from every college have been marked absent or failed due to the blunder.

dipti.sonawala@expressindia.com