From next year, CBSE Class 12 answer sheets to be available on Digilocker: Education ministry

From next year, scanned copies of answer scripts will be available on Digilocker for Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) students, an education ministry official said today. The CBSE Class 12 result marksheets are already available on Digilocker.gov.in.

The ministry and CBSE board are both facing massive public criticism for their shoddy handling of the Class 12 exams. The re-evaluation process for the CBSE Class 12 results has been marred by glitches and now, students and cybersecurity experts are questioning the evaluation process itself. For the first time, the CBSE adopted on-screen marking (OSM) for all Class 12 exams.

The education ministry and CBSE board, an autonomous body under it, maintain the process of awarding the contract for on-screen marking (OSM) of CBSE Class 12 answer scripts was “scrupulous” and that in the financial bit, COEMP Edu Teck won over the other contender, Tata Consultancy Services. The education ministry source also said that the scanned copies were mixed up for 20 students who had applied for the answer sheets as part of the re-evaluation process.

Despite a reportedly sketchy past, COEMPT Edu Teck was awarded the contract simply because it offered much lower rates. The per-copy cost quoted by COEMPT was Rs 25.75, inclusive of taxes. TCS’ was charging roughly Rs 65 per copy.

Asked whether the company would face penalties over the mix-ups and other problems , a source said “the clauses of the agreement” will be followed by the board after the completion of the entire process. Out of the 17 lakh students who appeared for the Class 12 examination, little more than 4 lakh had applied for getting answer books.

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COEMPT Edu Tech Vs TCS: Lowest bidder

The tender was for a quality and cost-based selection (QCBS) – a form of procurement that doesn’t just consider the lowest bid but also quality – with 70% weightage to technical aspects and 30% for financial.

The CBSE board floated the tenders for OSM. A source said, “In the third tender, TCS and COEMPT qualified. In the financial aspect, COEMPT had quoted around Rs.25.75 per copy inclusive of taxes.”

The official also said the company has been working in close to 18 states.

On the allegations of the company being blacklisted in Telangana, the official states, “The matter of the post examination management which the company had handled went to the Telangana High Court and it was found that there was nothing unusual. The company has also done retesting and there were no problems found.”

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IIT Madras, Kanpur on making OSM portal fool-proof

Due to a malicious attack on the portal, there was a problem when the re-evaluation process began, said the official. There were 50 students who had been over-charged due to the attack .

“There were issues with space but now we have moved to Amazon Web Services,” said the official.

The team from IIT Kanpur and IIT Madras, along with their directors, are known to be camping at the CBSE office. They will be submitting a report to the ministry soon.

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“The team is looking at the system entirely to figure out what made it vulnerable. The focus at the moment is to make it entirely foolproof and without any glitches,” said the official.

The re-evaluation process will begin from June 1 .