West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has announced the government’s decision to cancel the Madhyamik and Uchhamadhyamik exams 2021 in view of the coronavirus pandemic. The state board had scheduled the Class 10 exams in the second week of August and the Class 12 exam in late July.

On Monday, the CM said the evaluation methods for Class 10 (Madhyamik) and Class 12 (Uchhamadhyamik) students will be fixed by the state board after consultation with experts and the Education Department and the criteria will be announced within seven days.

The West Bengal government had on Sunday sought public opinion on the issue via email. According to Banerjee, the government has received 34,000 emails and 79 per cent of them suggested Madhyamik exams should be scrapped and 83 per cent were against higher secondary exams.

The decision to cancel the exams outright comes just days after the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) and the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE) decided to cancel their Class 12 board exams for this year.

In the last few days, the governments of Maharashtra, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Mizoram, Uttarakhand have scrapped the Class 12 board exams, while several states are likely to take a call on the issue soon.