Madhyamik: 10 more held with mobiles, entire exam cancelled

Kolkata: Ten candidates were caught with mobile phones during the Physical Science paper of the Madhyamik Examination on Tuesday, prompting the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education (WBBSE) to cancel their entire examinations and pushing the total to 49 after six days.

The cases were reported from centres across multiple districts. One candidate of Elit Co-Ed School was caught at Hooghly Girls’ High School in Hooghly. One candidate of Sanko Chandrasekhar High School was detected at Galsi Kalimati Debi High School in East Burdwan, while one candidate of Gosairhat High School was caught at Dakghara High School in Cooch Behar.

Four candidates — three from Punam Chand Mittal Memorial High School and one from Inner Heart Secondary School — were caught at Madhu T E High School (Bengali Medium) in Alipurduar.

In Nadia, one candidate each from Karimpur Jagannath High School, Karimpur Girls’ High School, and Rajarmath Ramkrishna Adarsha High School was caught at their respective exam venues.

Board rules state that the entire examination of a candidate is cancelled if any electronic device, including a mobile phone, calculator, earbuds, smartwatch, or Bluetooth device, is found in the examination hall.

Earlier, one candidate was caught with a mobile on the first day, five on the second, 13 on the third, 12 on the fourth, and eight on the fifth, taking the total to 49 after six days.

On Tuesday, 81 candidates appeared for the examination from hospitals. One candidate in Uttar Dinajpur was reported against (RA) after allegedly tearing the answer script at the end of the paper. Mpost