New Delhi: Patna police resorted to lathi-charge outside the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) office, where hundreds of aspirants gathered Friday to protest the possibility of normalisation of marks in the BPSC Integrated 70th Combined (Preliminary) Competitive Examination. Aspirants are demanding that the exam be held in a ‘one shift, one paper’ format, and that BPSC issue an official statement denying normalisation.
Normalisation of marks is a process through which marks obtained in exams held in two or more shifts are equalised using a statistical formula. A candidate is given a percentage score on the basis of marks obtained.
The BPSC Integrated 70th Combined (Preliminary) Competitive Examination for recruitment of Group A and B posts is to be held on 13 December. About five lakh candidates are expected to appear for the examination, which will be held across 925 centres.
BPSC initially advertised 1,957 vacancies in its notification, later revising it to 2,035.
Manish Singh, a BPSC aspirant, told ThePrint over the phone from Patna that more than 90,000 aspirants registered for the exam and paid the fee, but “couldn’t complete the application due to server issues”.
“Despite meetings with teachers, there has been no dialogue with students. There are rumours about the exams being conducted in multiple shifts. Exam centers are far and away, some as far as 300-400 km,” he added.
Back in Patna, heavy police deployment was seen outside the BPSC office. Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Anu Kumari told reporters on the spot that the “way they [aspirants] are protesting right now is illegal”.
“These people do not have any kind of permission. They are jamming the road, blocking it. All this is illegal. We are asking for names of five people. We will take a delegation of these five people to talk [to BPSC],” she said.
Meanwhile, Patna-based educator Faizal Khan, popularly known as ‘Khan Sir’, visited the protest site Friday to show solidarity with the aspirants. “They respected my decision by coming here, and now I will respect theirs by standing with them to oppose normalisation. If students’ time is wasted, BPSC must extend the exam date. Additionally, those who couldn’t fill the form due to server issues should be given an extra day,” he said.
The controversy over ‘normalisation’ in the Integrated 70th Combined (Preliminary) Competitive Examination stems from speculation that the BPSC may be planning to implement this process starting this time.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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