First-year results: Students take to the streets once again

Protesters demand scrutiny of papers, BISE chairman’s resignation

LAHORE: Disgruntled students once again took to the streets on Thursday to protest against Intermediate Part-I results, demanding scrutiny of their papers and resignations of board officials.

Students rallied against the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education (BISE) outside the Lahore Press Club, holding placards and banners and shouting slogans against the board officials.

They demanded the results announced should be cancelled and all papers be rechecked anew by ‘senior and qualified’ teachers.

They also demanded the board officials, including chairman, secretary and controller, should immediately resign and be probed for their ‘negligence’.

The students called for publicly naming the teachers, who had checked the papers. They claimed the recent controversy and protests against boards all over Punjab had proved the system in place for checking papers had failed, putting their future at stake.

Ali Ahmed, a protester, told The Express Tribune that the students would continue their protests until their demands were met. “The boards are playing with our future and now they are increasing up to 10 marks of students who have applied for rechecking to stop the protests,” he said. “Students from all over the province are complaining and the government is trying to sweep the matter under the rug.”

Some students present at the protest said that they had received SMS confirmation that their marks had been increased after rechecking.

Usman, another protester from Punjab College, said he had received an SMS that his marks were increased, but said this only proved the marking was not done fairly.

He claimed the issue arose because junior teachers had marked the papers. He demanded that a permanent solution should be found instead of increasing marks to gratify students.

Widespread student demonstrations broke out earlier this month after the BISE announced the Inter Part-1 results.

An inquiry committee was established by Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif to probe the matter.

More than 70,000 scrutiny applications were received by the BISE from which the committee randomly selected a sample of 10,000 papers for rechecking.

The probe concluded the marking was overall fair and only some papers were poorly marked.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 28^th, 2016.