Flying squads detect six UMCs

LUDHIANA: While cheating remains a contentious issue during exams, flying squads of education department have only managed to report six cases related to unfair means case (UMC) to higher authorities. With this, the exact number of cheating cases have not yet been compiled by the education department.
Among those who are likely to face the music due to unethical practices during exams are Guru Teg Bahadur School, Senior Secondary School Khanna, Spring Senior Secondary School, Khanna Khurd, Government Senior Secondary School, Chakori, Senior Secondary School, Hathur, and Senior Secondary School Nasrli.
Requesting anonymity, an official of the education department stated that Punjab School Education Board (PSEB) has its own squads, while the team sent by DEO is a separate one in each school. This has led to a lot of confusion and the department is not able to keep a record of number of such cases. Only those cases are coming in record which are reported by principals or the education department.
However, with an aim to discourage unfair means and copying during the examinations, PSEB has filed 32 such cases during the last board exams. There are 3,124 examination centres, out of which 376 are in the district. During the last board examinations, when maximum cheating cases were found, a total of 37 such centres were excluded from the list.
These include 21 examination centres in Amritsar, 11 in Gurdaspur, one in Patiala and two each in Ludhiana and Taran Taran.
Talking to TOI, DEO Bichittar Singh stated that it was true that proper UMC records were not being maintained by the department as PSEB has sent its own flying squads, which did not report such matters to him. The DEO added that he has was not aware regarding the number of such squads being roped in the district for checking.