Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking permission to let the State government adhere to its decision on cancellation of university-college examinations in view of the rising COVID-19 cases.
In his letter, the Chief Minister has urged the Prime Minister to advise the Ministry of Human Resource Development and the University Grants Commission to reconsider its decision on mandatory conduct of final term exams by September. “UGC may be asked to reiterate its earlier issued guidelines of April 29, 2020, wherein it had been clearly mentioned that the guidelines were advisory in nature and each State-university would chart out its own plan of action taking into consideration the issues pertaining to COVID-19 pandemic,” he wrote.
Capt. Amarinder wrote that the State government had on July 3, 2020, decided to cancel all pending UG and PG final term examinations and to promote the students on the basis of performance in previous years-semesters.
“Conducting online examination for such a large number of students, majority of whom reside in rural areas without assured access to computers-laptops and internet, is also not possible,” he added.
