Bangalore University (BU), which is grappling with allegations of large-scale mess up in the evaluation of undergraduate (UG) answer scripts, has revealed that at least 11 per cent of students had scored 15.
BU Registrar (Evaluation) R.K. Somashekhar, during a press conference here on Tuesday, after the meeting of the varsity’s syndicate, said, “An analysis of around 13.5 lakh answer scripts of the second, fourth and sixth semesters also showed that 17 per cent had scored between 15 and 30, 21 per cent between 30 and 45, 27 per cent between 45 and 60 marks. Around 24 per cent scored more than 60.” He said each student in the 27 per cent who had scored between 0 and 30 had failed in at least one subject.
“The biggest number was in commerce in the quantitative business analysis where 8,817 of 23,097 students who had appeared had failed. We will have to check if it is the fault of the evaluators or not. A random check of 10 per cent of the answer scripts showed that 50 per cent of the marks tallied with the marks scored in the OMR scripts. The second highest number of failed students is in English, followed by maths and physics,” Prof. Somashekhar explained.
Alleging that not many complaints had been registered through BU’s portal (which caters exclusively to exam-related issues), he said only 779 complaints had been registered so far, of which 400 had been resolved. “We are looking at announcing the results of re-evaluation at least of the sixth semester students before October 30,” he added.
Custodian issues
Speaking of the problems encountered during the evaluation, Prof. Somashekhar said while most number of complaints was from the second semester students, one particular evaluation centre was specifically problematic. “The custodian at the Seshadripuram College centre where B.Com second and fourth semester papers were evaluated showed irresponsible behaviour and was un-cooperative from the beginning. He will definitely be blacklisted. Even today, when we sent our people to get bundles of answer scripts for re-evaluation, he locked up the room and sent them back empty-handed,” he alleged.
The Registrar also raised some eyebrows when he said the custodian at Maharani Lakshmi Ammanni College for Women had still not completed the re-evaluation of 360 answer scripts of the November 2012 exam.
Last chance
The website hosting company is also in the dock as Vice-Chancellor B. Thimme Gowda said the upcoming November-December exams would be the company’s last chance at redemption. “We will continue with them depending on their performance in this exam,” he said.
