University Grants Commission (UGC) panel to revisit the guidelines for university and colleges exams has decided to recommend scrapping the final year examinations, too, reports Times of India. A formal announcement about the decision will be conveyed in the next few days, adds the report.

As per the earlier guidelines, the Commission had recommended to do away with the intermediate examinations but had asked universities to conduct the final year/semester examinations.

According to the revised guidelines, as per the MHRD sources, universities and colleges would grade the students based on performance in previous years or semesters and internal assessments. Detail of the same will be issued soon, reports TOI.

MHRD had formed a panel this week to issue revised guidelines due to the large number of institutions expressing inability to conduct final year exams due to the COVID-19 situation.

At least four states - Maharashtra, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, and Haryana - have taken a decision to cancel the university and college exams in their state including the final year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Students have flooded the social media requesting the government to cancel all the exams or to postpone them.

On May 29, the Commission had issued a detailed guideline for examination and admission for the next academic session. HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal had conveyed that exams will be conducted only for final year students, and first and second year students will be promoted without an exam.

The total number of COVID-19 cases crosses 4.7 lakh figure on Wednesday with more than 14,500 deaths in the country. Maharashtra has registered a total number of 1.42 lakh cases followed by Delhi with more than 70 thousand cases and Tamil Nadu with more than 67 thousand.