GIS@development June 2000; Examination-'A Myth' !!!

The hot scorching summer heat brings along with it hot news like “Girls outshine boys once again”. The news is in relation to the results of board examination and the girls outshine the boys as their pass percentage is higher. But as the saying goes, “All that glitters is not gold”, the news publishers as well as the readers in India generally overlook the harsh reality of the obstacles that Indian girls have to overcome to achieve the success. In reality, the total number of girl students is much less than the boy students in most of the states in India. In those states where the above situation is an exception, usually among the number of students leaving their study after primary or secondary level, the proportion of girl students is more than the boys. Secondary Examination stands as an automatic eliminator for most of the students and among them a vey few girl students actually make it to that level. But many of them who are able to reach the higher secondary level, have to accept their confined family life. For them, the preparation for examinations is carried on simultaneously while doing domestic works side by side. From this perspective, the good performance of girls in board examinations is not a matter to be highlighted with golden letters.

But the helplessness of the media can also be understood as the concerned boards do not disclose anything except the total pass percentage. Then do not even disclose the rural pass percentage vis-a-vis the urban pass percentage. The examination boards justifies this by saying that they never want to compare the urban and rural situations separately. Why they don’t want to view in that way? There is no proper answer to this question. Analysing the reasons behind such hesitations we may assume that this type of comparison, if revealed, can bring out the real ‘divide’ between the rural and urban situation. A recent survey shows that in rural India, out of hundred girl students admitted to class I, only one student reaches the 12th standard. The educational progress among the scheduled caste people is also not satisfactory as only about five per cent of the scheduled caste students succeed to reach class 12th only to be used as puppets in the hands of politicians.

The statewide game played in the name of examination is very funny. Every year, it is played all over the country. However, people interested in this game rarely feel the need to think deep into this matter. Nobody is curious enough to identify the failures or find the reasons behind their failures. Inqiusitive minds stumble upon the fact that the majority of the failures belong to the poor, rural and suppressed classes. In our ‘so-called’civilised society, examination has become a legal tool, the sharp edge of which is used to wipe out the weaker section from the system. The mindset of this society is such that only hard-working students succeed and the rest fail. We hardly have any knowledge about the number of failed students, leave apart their geographical location or social status. The situation in Kerala, the most literate state of India, is such that out of 5.5 lakh examinees, 2.5 lakh could not succeed. Who are they? The media has no answers to it. If we try to search for answers, we would find that a large number of such students come from backward areas like Mallapuram and Idukki. They generally belong to poor families and backward classes in those areas. Kerala’s Education Minister, while declaring the fact, confessed that had the 25% grace marks not been given to the students, the pass percentage would have remained only 43% as compared to 56% at present.

Using this system to brand unsuccessful students as ‘failures’ is nothing less than a social magic. Like a blanket, the examination system wraps up all the differences and inequalities prevailing in the society.

The power of the pin-drop silence during the three hours of examination is such that the students forget their background differences. Rich and poor students are evaluated on the same scale. A student from a school without any atlas is evaluated in the same scale with another who usually accesses atlases through Internet. For the sake of an impartial competition, the students identified through roll number. The results are declared with full state grandeur. The curtains are raised and the public welcome the results with a standing ovation. The students from the schools lacking in infrastructural facilities are wiped out. The colourful photographs in newspapers show beautiful and well dressed girls enjoying the results of their ‘hard’ studies.

The media has such power that it can amass news from every nook and corner. But they generally stay far away from those villages where not even a single student succeeds. The harsh fact in the present society is that nobody can survive without having faith in the ‘myth’ of examinations. However, this myth that coins the students’ failures, will break only when the students’ name, address, their parents’ income and their social upbringing are made available to all. Then only the questions of social differences between the successful and the failures will crop up in our minds. In the light of this question we will start to suspect the fact that examination is not just a matter of brain and hard work, but a game of cruel circumstances. But till the real statistics of the results are disclosed, the traditional myth of examination will continue along with the increasing ‘hidden’ inequality among the students.

The Article was published in Jansatta on June 11, 2000 and reproduced with permission.