Telangana student who committed suicide had passed exam

A Class 11 student in Telangana, who had committed suicide after she was declared "failed" in the exams by the Board of Intermediate Education (BIE), had scored the pass marks, the result of re-verification of her answer sheet shows.

Upset over the failure, Anamika Arutla had ended her life. However, more than a month after her death, the re-verification of answer script by the BIE revealed that she had, in fact, passed.

Following the revaluation of answer sheets, her marks in Telugu subject increased by 28. She was earlier declared "fail" for scoring only 20 marks in the subject.

This instance which came to light on Saturday is the most damning for the BIE, whose massive bungling in valuation and processing of results allegedly led to suicide by 26 students.

After watching the result of re-verification on the BIE website, the family members of Anamika have demanded action against the top Board officials.

A student of Class 11 at the Pragati Maha Vidyalaya in Hyderabad, Anamika was depressed after the BIE announced the results on April 18. Her marks sheet showed that she passed in all subjects except Telugu, in which she secured only 20 marks.

She scored 64 marks in English, 55 in Economics, 67 in Civics and 75 in Commerce. Unable to come to terms with the failure, she committed suicide by hanging.

The re-verification revealed that Anamika had scored 48 marks and not 20.

The BIE had declared the results of intermediate (Classes 11 and 12) examinations on April 18. Out of 9.43 lakh students who appeared in the exams, 5.6 lakh had cleared it. After the announcement of results, goof-up by the authorities in evaluation of answer scripts and processing the results came to light, triggering a huge public outcry.

The spate of suicides by students over failure in exams kicked up a storm with opposition parties and student bodies taking to the streets demanding justice to the students.

After the matter reached the Telangana High Court, Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao on April 24 announced free re-verification of answer sheets of all failed students.

The BIE on May 27 announced results of re-verification of answer scripts of over 3.82 lakh students who had failed to obtain pass marks. Following this process, 1,137 students, who were earlier declared "failed", cleared the exams.

According to the BIE, of the 23 students committed who suicide and three students attempted suicide, re-verification of their answer scripts showed that there is no change from fail to pass.

The student bodies and NGOs claimed that 26 students had ended their lives. Anamika's case came to light after her family checked the results on the BIE website on Saturday.

Balala Hakkula Sangham's honourary President Achyuta Rao, who is a petitioner in the Telangana High Court, said he would request the court to take cognizance of Anamika's case and order action against BIE higher-ups for their negligence, which led to her death.

--IANS

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