Inside Track

Sharing limelight

Differences have cropped up between the Delhi Government and the Human Resources Development Ministry over the arrangements for the concluding ceremony of the 50 years of Independence on August 15. The minister M.M. Joshi, who attends his office at Shastri Bhavan infrequently, ishowever, taking keen interest in the programme. He feels there should be less focus on the Prime Minister and more on himself. For a start he has insisted on reducing the time for Vajpayee’s speech on this historic occasion from 17 minutes to a mere five minutes.

CBSE’s Pandora’s box

Every year thousands of students receive marks which are totally at variance with their actual examination performance at the CBSE and this probably scars them emotionally for life. The CBSE assiduously guards its right not to allow an answer paper to be re-checked since otherwise it would be thoroughly exposed.

I know of a case in which an influential government officer got his child’s political science paper scrutinised informally and it was discovered that for every two-mark answer, the teacher had allotted one mark, although the answers were perfect. But despite his clout the answer sheet could not be re-checked. Two years ago, when I pointed out to the CBSE chairman B.P. Khandelwal that the really goodstudents in English always ended up with much lower marks than those who could barely string two sentences together, Khandelwal acknowledged placidly that English papers were evaluated by government school teachers whose own English left much to be desired.The number of students sitting for the CBSE exam has more than doubled in the last decade to over 600,000 and the problem is that the board does not hire enough qualified teachers. Overloaded examiners often end up spending barely three minutes on checking an answer sheet.

After the board results, CBSE keeps stringing along infuriated parents who insist that there has been a mistake by promising that in exceptional cases, the answer papers will even be shown in confidence to the parent to dispel misgivings about unfair marking. This promise never actually materialises. In fact, by the time the slip arrives in the mail informing that there is no change in the marks, college admissions are already over.Within a few months the CBSE will destroy thetell-tale evidence sealed in the answer papers. Before this happens some affected parents, possibly with the help of public spirited individuals like H.D. Shourie, should file a public interest litigation (PIL) asking for a scrutiny of certain corrected CBSE answer papers where the school teachers are certain that the pupils have been wrongly assessed. This is the only way to ensure some accountability in the marking system in future.

Looking ahead

Sitaram Kesri grumbles to close confidantes that Soniaji’ seems content to rest on her laurels, while as Congress president he had the guts to bring down two governments. He points out that despite all the hue and cry over the Jain Commission report no Congressman even suggested the tabling of part two in the last parliamentary session. Kesri has fallen on bad days while earlier the CBI had indicated to the court that it did not appear that he could be charge-sheeted for disproportionate assets, recently the CBI sought the help of the Income Taxauthorities to assist in the ongoing probe. Though the Congress still provides Kesri a car, the garage’s repair bill of some Rs 35,000 has yet to be cleared.

In the Rajya Sabha nomination from Bihar it was presumed that Kesri would root for his favourite R.R. Sahu as against Rameshwar Thakur. Instead he lobbied for an outsider like Kapil Sibal simply because Laloo Prasad Yadav asked him to put in a good word for his lawyer. The 83-year-old Kesri perhaps hopes that in return Laloo may help him out when his Rajya Sabha term expires in 2000 AD!

French leave

The Textiles Ministry has booked at great expense the prestigious Louvre Museum in Paris for a show of Indian fashions and textiles next month in which leading Indian designers are to take part. A French PR firm is being hired to drum up publicity. The snag is that the show is scheduled on July 16 and most French buyers and designers will have left the city by then since July 14 is a holiday and traditionally Parisians leave town that week.