Education Minister ANM Ehsanul Haque Milon has said the HSC examinations were kept on after speaking to everyone concerned, telling parliament: “We took the decision after monitoring the situation until 5 p.m. Everyone said the weather would be fine, and that is why we kept the examinations on.”
The minister made the remarks on Tuesday (July 14) in reply to a supplementary question from independent member of parliament Rumin Farhana during the question-and-answer session of the Jatiya Sangsad. The session, presided over by Deputy Speaker Kaisar Kamal, began with the question-and-answer round.
In her supplementary question, independent MP Rumin Farhana said: “The HSC examinations are going on. For the past three or four days, big cities including Dhaka and Chattogram were submerged under water. Students had requested that the examinations be postponed, but that decision was not taken, which is why there are protests today, in Dhaka. My question to the minister is — for such an extremely important examination as the HSC, on which the future direction of a boy’s or girl’s life depends, and in a subject like physics, will the honorable minister kindly say what the problem was in postponing the examination by a day or two?”
In reply, Education Minister ANM Ehsanul Haque Milon said: “We hold examinations across the whole of Bangladesh simultaneously. There are about 2,700 HSC examination centers, and examinations begin at the same time in 64 districts. As you have already heard, when Chattogram was flooded, we postponed the examinations in phases — first Rangamati, then Bandarban, then Khagrachhari, and then the entire Chattogram board.” He said: “We were observing the rain and monitoring the situation regularly. At that time we spoke with the SPs of the 64 districts, the divisional commissioners of the eight divisions and the chairmen of every education board, and we also contacted the Meteorological Department. They said there would be no more rain. We took the decision after monitoring the situation until 5 p.m. Everyone concerned said the weather would be fine, and that is why we kept the examinations on.”
The minister said: “But when I got up in the morning I found that the grounds of the Cumilla Government Women’s College had filled with water. We immediately directed the mayor, the fire service, the police and the deputy commissioner to arrange to shift the examination center. The examinees were then taken by boat to the five-storey building of that school and the examination was held. We observed the whole matter.” He said the deputy commissioners of the whole of Bangladesh had also been consulted and had reported that there had been no disaster-related problem in holding examinations anywhere, and that the incident had happened only at the Cumilla Government Women’s College. There, he said, orders had been given to start the examination late; the girl whose clothes had got wet was given clothes brought from her home, allowed to sit the examination an hour later and given extra time.
“I want to tell the nation that in our examination management the local administration — the deputy commissioner, UNO and police administration — can instantly decide whether an examination can be held at a center, and can even postpone it if necessary,” the minister said. “We spoke to them repeatedly, and they said, ‘No sir, we are taking the examinations properly.’ You too have seen where there was rainwater. We all noticed it. We too have affection for these tender children, which is why we are always monitoring the situation.”
The minister also said there had been an error in questions 6 and 7 of the physics paper. “We took charge only four months ago. The question moderation had already been completed. As you know, the question-moderation process has to be started two years in advance. We could not prepare any new questions after coming in; the moderators from the time of the previous government prepared this question paper,” he said. “Even so, we immediately announced that there had been an error in physics questions 6 and 7 and that students would be given full marks for those two questions.” He said all kinds of support had been ensured so that the examinations could be held properly, and that after speaking to everyone concerned throughout the day, all stakeholders had reported that the examinations had been held smoothly and well, with the incident occurring only at the Cumilla Government Women’s College, where too the examination was ultimately held without trouble.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report