HPU allows 'failed' first year students to sit in second year pending re-evaluation

The Students Federation of India on Tuesday embarked on a 24-hour symbolic strike on the university campus to protest against the alleged inaccuracy in the online evaluation system responsible for low pass percentage.SFI Vice president of the HPU campus unit Harish said the Enterprise resource planning ERP online system was responsible for the mess as the entire evaluation work was given to a private company on contract and there is no supervision by regular staff members.

The Himachal Pradesh University (HPU) on Tuesday allowed the students who failed in BA, BSc and Bcom first year to sit in second year on the condition that they would be sent back to first year in case they fail in the re-evaluation. According to a notification issued by the HPU Registrar, such students would be allowed to sit in the second year classes only after giving an undertaking that they agree to be returned to first year if they fail the re-evaluation.

Low pass percentage in the three courses in first year across HPU colleges has sparked a row in the state with several students' bodies lodging protests against the online evaluation system. After the protests, a five member fact finding committee was constituted to look into the matter by the HPU Pro Vice Chancellor. “About 300 papers were re-checked randomly and it was found that all the papers were properly scanned and marked. The committee would check about 5,000 papers (50 papers of each subject from colleges where the pass percentage is less than 10 and the report would be submitted in ten days),” said Dean of Studies Kulbhushan Chandel, who is also the chairman of the committee.

J S Negi, Controller of Examination, HPU, said that the overall results for first year BSc was 31 per cent, for BA 57 per cent, and for BCom 58 per cent.

The RSS-backed ABVP and leftist SFI alleged that a snag in the online system has resulted in low pass percentage.

Over 42,000 students had appeared in the examination in these courses in May-June this year and the results were declared in November. The Students’ Federation of India on Tuesday embarked on a 24-hour symbolic strike on the university campus to protest against the alleged inaccuracy in the online evaluation system responsible for low pass percentage.

SFI Vice president of the HPU campus unit Harish said the Enterprise resource planning (ERP) – online system was responsible for the ''mess'' as the entire evaluation work was given to a private company on contract and there is no supervision by regular staff members. He claimed that results of about 80 per cent students were lower than expected. The president of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, HPU unit, Ashish said that the low pass percentage has caused mental stress to all first year students. The BAVP member also said that varsity officials would not be allowed to enter the university campus if the discrepancies in results are not removed in seven days.

“Teachers were opposed to online evaluation but the university authorities were adamant and went on with it despite problems and without imparting training to the teachers,” said Dr R L Sharma, General Secretary, Himachal Pradesh Government College Teachers' Association (HGCTA).

He said that majority of the teachers had not taken part in the online evaluation process.

Sharma said that the results have been delayed by over two months with the pass percentage now being under scanner.

Moreover, secrecy is another issue, earlier centres were created and two-tier spot evaluations were done, he added. All the same, a section of teachers are of the view that buckling under the pressure of students to allow them to sit in second year before re-evaluation of papers does not augur well for the university and there should be no compromise on the quality of education.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)