Srinagar: Expressing pained by “un-necessary controversy” being created about the education of our children, the Kashmir Chamber of Commerce & Industry (KCC&I) on Thursday asked government to reschedule the examination of class tenth and twelfth students.
“There can be no two opinions about the fact that the education of children is at the core of our heart. But unfortunately, due to the present unrest the education of our children has suffered for no fault of theirs thereby putting their future in jeopardy,” the Kashmir’s elite trade body said in a statement issued this evening.
Notably, the J&K BOSE on Thursday reduced the syllabus of the tenth and twelfth classes by half for their examination scheduled to be held from 15th of this month. BOSE chairman, Prof Zahoor Ahmad Chat said that examination will be held on time and the examination will start at 11 AM on their due dates.
“As all of us know that the life of entire population in general and student community in particular has come to a standstill on account of curfews and shutdowns for the past 118 days during which period all the educational institutions have remained closed. It has resulted in non-completion of the syllabus, failure to even hold minimum required classes by the educational institutions and the inability of students to attend the minimum required classes. These are e basic requirements for conducting the examination. Also, the long period of continued uprising has not been conducive for student community to concentrate on their studies even privately,” the KCCI statement said.
“Moreover,” the statement said, “the children have been traumatized by the current cycle of violence with a large number of them injured or detained. Under the circumstances forcing them to appear in exams is detrimental to them. It serves no one’s purpose to make education and exams a matter of prestige. Even the Government announcement about slashing down of syllabus is futile as it will only harm the interest of the students in the long run.”
“The decision of holding the exams in November will be unfair to a large number of students who have either been injured or have been detained under various provisions of law,” the KCCI asserted while appealing to the Government not to make it as a “prestigious issue” but to take a realistic approach towards the problem.
“We appeal to the Government to reschedule the exams till the month of March-2017, release all the detained students immediately, enable time to injured students to recuperate. This will provide a fair opportunity to all to study and appear in re-scheduled exams in March as had been happening in Kashmir sine ages,” the statement said, “politics apart let there be no politics and scoring of points as for as the education and future of our children is concerned.”