The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has today conducted class 12 English paper and students have complained about an out of syllabus question. According to syllabus prescribed by the board, students are expected to study one out of two novels – ‘Invisible Man’ or ‘Silas Marner’, as there is an internal choice and the examinees have to answer only one question based on the novel section.
However, in the CBSE class 12 English exam 2019, questions from both the novels were asked. A teacher from DMS, Jalandhar said, “We only taught one novel to students and each school does the same. Now, a six marks question was asked from the other novel too, which was not taught. This is not fair to the students.”
READ | Students point to Class XII English paper ‘anomaly’, CBSE says will protect examinees’ interest
The board has agreed to the goof-up but said that no student would be put on a disadvantage. Talking to the indianexpress.com, CBSE spokesperson said, “There is no error in the question paper. A committee always sits to finalise marking scheme for questions while checking the response by students.”
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The questions 11 and 12 of the English core paper quizzed students on the novels. Both Q11 and Q12 had 4 sub-sections out of which students had to attempt only one. According to the format, the sub-questions in each Q11 and Q12 should have been from both novels but in the Set 1 question paper, all the questions were from the same novel leaving students with no internal choice. In the set 1, all sub-questions in question 11 were from ‘Silas Marner’ and question 12 had all questions from ‘Invisible Man’. Each question – 11 and 12 – was of six marks.
“There is a mechanism to take care of such issues before fianlising the making scheme so that students are not out to any disadvantage,” said an official statement by the board.
Ironically, the CBSE had said that it would increase the internal choices to keep the exam easy and consideration for writing in one’s own words was also to be given to students.
Students took to Twitter to show anger and demanded ‘full grace marks’
@cbseindia29 @HRDMinistry@aajtak @ravishndtv @abpnewshindi@PMOIndia@DDNewsHindi
Today in Cbse AISSCE 2019 ENGLISH Wrong Questions was printed i.e. Q. 11 which was supposed to have option of two novel but cbse has given only one option.
Will we will get Grace Marks or Not? pic.twitter.com/1w5NDXvf9K— Sushrut Kumar Singh (@SushrutKSingh) March 2, 2019
As per CBSE there are two novels in 12th board.
Both que 11 & 12 needs to have 2 questions from each novel.
But 11th question comprised of only Silas Marner.
Students having Invisible Man couldn't write it.
CBSE must give grace marks here.#AcademicTwitter @cbseportal @CBSEINDIA pic.twitter.com/fViehkcLaV— T Balajee Jha (@tbalajeejha) March 2, 2019
#CBSE#EnglishCorepaper#Class12English
Major error in not giving choice for question no 11 & 12. Every school follows only one book while question was from both books. Please allot full grace marks to the stumped students— Prince@007 (@rajapillai97) March 2, 2019
@cbseindia29 @HRDMinistry
There was a misprint in almost all sets of #cbse English core paper,(Q.11 and 12) which wasted almost 10 min of every student.
An extra nobel question was out of syllabus.
We need +6 grace marks. pic.twitter.com/vYYMQ7fcvN— Ankit Lal singh (@AnkitLalsingh2) March 2, 2019
Meanwhile, after having preponed the exam dates from March to February, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) will be releasing the results of class 10 and 12 earlier than the previous years.
In a list of instructions released earlier this month, the board has mentioned that they aim to bring out CBSE class 10, class 12 board results one week earlier than previous years. According to reports, the result can be expected by May 10, 2019.