KATHMANDU; As many as 466,300 students are taking the School Leaving Certificate (SLC) examination scheduled to be held from March 25 in 1,550 centres across the country.

The Office of the Controller of Examinations (OCE), organising a press conference today, stated all necessary preparations have been over. Admitting that irregularities have been taking place during the SLC examinations, exam controller Chitra Prasad Devkota said failure to curb them on time would jeopardise the credibility of the nationwide school-end examination.

The OCE has called on the guardians, teachers, students, security personnel and exam officials to conduct the examinations in a well-managed, free and fair manner. “The OCE will get a high-level body to monitor the examinations and to recommend bodies concerned to take action against those flouting the norms,” read a statement issued by the controller.

Answer books have reached all the districts and so have question papers in districts outside the Kathmandu Valley. OCE officials have provided necessary instructions to officials in charge of the exam centres. The OCE will soon conduct an orientation programme at marking centres in order to avoid errors in the exam results.

The security committee headed by the education minister has endorsed the points required by the OCE to facilitate the administration of the examination while district-based examination coordination committees have been instructed to carry out the same.

In the districts, a meeting of political parties, professional unions of teachers, parents’ representatives, student unions and administration representatives will formulate and commit to implementing codes of conduct.

In each exam centre, meetings will be held among the guardians and the school management committee to make the exam centres safe and decent by constituting exam support committees. Persons blacklisted for being involved in unlawful activities will be denied such responsibilities in future, it was stated.

Monitoring committees led by a joint-secretary will be formed for each of the 14 zones. Secretary at the Ministry of Education, Ram Sworup Sinha said the malpractices seen during the biggest examination of the country need to be corrected.

Kathmandu has the largest number of students taking the exam while Manang has the least with 32,639 and 91, respectively.