Maharashtra: Edu minister assures to shift students from 'inconvenient' SSC exam centre to other schools

Mumbai: A day after a school in Dadar complained about lack of facilities at an exam centre for its students in Wadala, the state School Education Minister Deepak Kesarkar assured that all 170 candidates that were assigned the centre will be shifted to other schools.

The minister made the assuarance on Friday in the state legislature during its ongoing budget session, after Vilas Potnis, Member of Legislative Council (MLC) from Shiv Sena raised the issue.

According to the complaint letter to Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education (MSBSHSE), the students are not able to focus on their exams as the board center is situated in a noisy area. The benches provided to students for the exam are small and intended for primary school students, wrote the school principal.

The principal also alleges that the classrooms have no fans or proper ventilation. "The roof (of the exam centre classrooms) is made of Asbestos sheets, which make the room very hot and unbearable for the children to sit in this condition for three hours, especially when they are writing a board exam. Children are sweating profusely and they are unable to concentrate and write", read the letter, a copy of which was accessed by The Free Press Journal.

However, the board, on its part, had said that the school has adequate facilities. “The education inspector has examined the centre located in Shri Ganesh Vidyalaya and reported that it has sufficient provisions to ensure that the students would face no problems while appearing for the board examination. The classrooms are spacious enough to accommodate all students who come there,” Dr. Subhash Borse, Secretary of Mumbai Division, Maharashtra State Board had said.