Justice C Hari Shankar recuses from hearing plea seeking modification of CBSE evaluation policy for Class X students

Justice C Hari Shankar of the Delhi High Court today recused from hearing a petition seeking modification of the policy of evaluation adopted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) for Class X students (Justice for All v. CBSE)..The matter was directed to be placed before another Bench on June 30..In light of the cancellation of board exams this year owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, CBSE had devised a method of evaluating Class X students based on internal assessment. This, the petition states, violates the fundamental rights of Class X students, under Articles 19(1)(a), 21 and 21A of the Constitution of India..The petitioner organisation had previously written to CBSE asking it to incorporate certain amendments in the policy. However, the recommendations fell on deaf ears, prompting the NGO to approach the High Court..It is alleged by petitioners that the present policy based on internal assessment could be misused by school managements against the wards of parents who have been fighting against the "commercialization of education.".It is further stated,"...the policy of moderating the average marks of the students assessed by the school, based on the historical performance of the previous average result of the school, in terms of the best overall performance of the school would be injustice to the students as the performance of school not relatable in any manner with the performance of the student.".Another claim is that there is no mechanism for grievance redressal put in place by the Board, and that the fate of the students have been left at hands of school managements..On these grounds, among others, the petitioner organisation has sought scrapping of the policy of moderation of marks based on the marks of Class X students of the current year, along with the previous year’s performance of school, district, state etc. The alternative prayer sought is:"...to direct the respondent no1 (CBSE) to permit the marks to be uploaded by schools even though the skewness with the average from the reference years average is more than +/-2 marks from the previous year’s performance of the schools.".Several other reliefs with regard to the re-evaluation policy, disclosure by schools of the rationale document for criteria of assessment of students, compartment exams, and wrong uploading of marks have also been sought..When the matter was last heard on June 2, a Bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh issued notice to the Central and Delhi governments as well as the Chairperson of CBSE..Delhi High Court seeks response from Central, Delhi govts, CBSE on plea for modification of policy to calculate marks for CBSE class 10 exam