UP govt enforces strict regulatory system to prevent Q-paper leaks: Officials

In a bid to ensure that no question papers of the states school examination board are leaked the Education Department has enforced a strict regulatory regime for strong rooms stocking papers across the stateThe regulatory commands range from surprise physical checks of strong rooms to limiting visitors to them and putting a complete ban on the use of mobile phones by staff manning or visiting them an official said on FridayThe additional measures were implemented following the recent leaks of class 12 board exam papers that led to the cancellation of examinations in 24 districts across the stateWhile the investigation of the incident is underway and over 34 suspects have been arrested so far Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has ordered invoking the National Security Act NSA against those involved in the leakageIn the Ballia district where the question papers were leaked senior officials including the district magistrate and superintendent of police are personally reviewing the arrangements put in place to prevent the leakageConcerned officials in the district have been asked to strictly monitor strong rooms where the board exam papers are kept At exam centres the officers have been asked to ensure that the entry into the strong rooms is strictly regulated and details of everyone entering it are registered in a log book Joint Director Education Yogendra Kumar Singh of Azamgarh Division told PTI on FridayThe officer had on Thursday personally inspected the district level board exam control room set up at the office of Ballias chief development officerThe concerned officials have been asked to practice utmost strictness to ensure that no mobile device is allowed inside the strong room or locker room where the exam papers are kept Absolutely no one is allowed to take a mobile phone inside that room he saidThe Secondary Education Department on the instructions of Uttar Pradesh Chief Secretary Durga Shankar Mishra has directed district officials across Uttar Pradesh to exercise strict vigilance to prevent the leakage of board exam papersIn a press statement on Thursday Additional Chief Secretary Secondary Education Aradhana Shukla had asked DMs and SPs to personally inspect exam papers and exam centres in their respective districtsThe officers have been asked to inspect at least 20 per cent of the board exam papers to ensure that they are safely kept in strong rooms and not tampered with The officers have also been asked to conduct a personal inspection of at least 20 per cent of exam centres in their districts she had saidShukla and other officials of the Education Department are keeping a close watch on the exam proceedings from the statelevel control room in LucknowWe receive audio and video feed from the very exam rooms of every exam centre across the state at the statelevel control room A team of officials are keeping a close watch on the feed We alert the concerned exam centres in realtime in case we notice any discrepancy or in case the audio feed from a particular centre is obstructed This prevents the possibility of paper leak and the use of unfair means she saidA total of 2781654 class 10 students including 1553198 boys and 1228456 girls are taking exams this year Similarly a total of 2411035 students including 1324200 males and 1086835 females are writing the examination for class 12The state government has set up 8373 exam centres across the state Of these 6398 centres are in rural areas and 1975 in urban areas The state government has declared 861 exam centres as sensitive 254 very sensitive and 7258 as generalAll these exam centres are being monitored closely with help of staff and a total of 297124 CCTV cameras an official said adding the feed of these cameras is being monitored at the statelevel examination command centre 75 districtlevel command centres and 8373 centrelevel command centresThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever