Mahatma Gandhi University has decided to shift university officials, whose children are studying in its affiliated colleges, from key posts in the examination wing to ensure secrecy and confidentiality. The move comes a day after The Hindu reported that the varsity has employees in key posts handling confidential matters in its examination wing, whose children are pursuing academic programmes in the varsity’s affiliated colleges.
As the first step towards avoiding such lapses in the future, an Assistant Registrar in the examination wing (responsible for co-ordinating setting of question papers and interacting with experts preparing it) was shifted to a section not connected with examination work on Thursday. The Hindu report had mentioned that his daughter was studying in an architecture college in Ernakulam affiliated to the university.
Confirming the development, Vice Chancellor Prof. Babu Sebastian said a mechanism would be in place to ensure that no employees, whose children were enrolled in affiliated colleges, undertook crucial examination-related work. “We will ask the employees concerned to give a declaration stating that their children are not studying in the varsity’s affiliated colleges,” he said. The university would strengthen monitoring process in the scanning, packing and delivery departments in the varsity.
Prof. Sebastian said he had asked the Controller of Examinations to review the system and plug the loopholes without delay.
The university would also examine the mix-up in the BBA off-campus examination held on Monday. The Hindu had reported on Tuesday that students of the first-year Bachelor programme of Business Administration under the off-campus could not believe their eyes after they learnt that the multiple-choice questions in the paper on Fundamentals of Business Statistics were based on the second-year syllabus.
