To encourage students with special needs, the CBSE has announced the list of students with special needs who have secured 90 per cent and above. These include children who have hearing impairment and learning disabilities. In Chennai, 168 of the 187 students who appeared for the exam have passed. The average pass per cent stands at 89.84. Seventeen students in the region in this category have secured above 90 per cent, while four have secured above 95 per cent. One such student was, Debasis Mohanty, an orthopedically-challenged student who scored 94.8 per cent. “I made notes every day. I did not let my disability get in the way of my preparations. I was born with a condition that did not allow me to run, but that has not deterred me from climbing up academically,” he says.