Exam squads blind action puts students in spot

COIMBATORE: A ‘blurred’ action by members of an examination flying squad left a group of 13 visually impaired students high and dry at two colleges in Coimbatore on Saturday.The squads, constituted by the Tamil Nadu Teachers Education University (TANTEU), which was overseeing the B.Ed semester examinations at the GRD College of Arts and Science and NGP College of Arts and Science here, allegedly snatched the answer papers of the visually-impaired students refusing to give them the mandatory extra time. These students were writing the examination, beyond half an hour of the stipulated time provided to normal candidates.While the candidates and their scribes pleaded that as per a GO (No 270, dated September 29, 1993), they were entitled for an hour’s extra time, the squad members rudely said that as per rules, only 30 minutes additional time can be granted.However, Express has a copy of a communication sent by the Tamil Nadu Higher Education Department to Registrars of all universities, as recently as August 6, 2009, informing them that all disabled students must be allocated an hour’s extra time.On the other hand, the flying squad members sought to skew the situation further saying that the scribes allotted to these candidates should be less qualified than them.Six visually-challenged students of the Bishop Appasamy College of Arts and Science, five from the Government College of Education for Women and two from the Nair College of Education were affected due to this mindless action. K Sudeesh, honorary legal advisor, Association for the Rights of the Visually Challenged (ARVIC), said “it appears that the flying squad members were still sticking to an earlier GO issued in 1984 as per which visually-impaired students were entitled for only 30 minutes extra time in examinations.” As for the flying squad’s argument on the qualification of scribes, he said the list of scribes was provided to the examination authorities much in advance.TANTEU Vice Chancellor T Padmanabhan could not be reached for his reaction.(With inputs from J Santhosh)