Bhubaneswar: Putting their lives at risk, around 40 students of Padiari School in Astaranga block of Puri district had to take a ferry ride on a foggy morning to appear in the annual Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) examination that began on Friday.
With no road connectivity owing to the half-done Biju Setu over River Devi at Talada, the students had no option but to take a boat ride to reach the examination centre at Surendra Nath Vidyapeeth on Friday morning. Clutching their admit cards, the students left their houses early in the morning to board the boat.
Sources said that chief minister Naveen Patnaik had laid the foundation stone of the bridge in 2014. The project was scheduled to complete last year. However, it is lying incomplete for reasons best known to the officials concerned.
Once completed, the bridge will connect Jagatsinghpur and Puri districts, sources said.
In another development, an hour after the commencement of the Matriculation examination across Odisha, question papers of Odia reportedly surfaced on social media in Nuapada district and Kamakhyanagar of Dhenkanal district.
Though the question papers were reportedly found to have gone viral on WhatsApp and other social media, school and mass education minister Badri Narayan Patra rubbished the reports stating that mobile phones were completely prohibited at the exam centres.
“As per the system, question papers are transported to nodal centres and kept there in police custody. Moreover, it was dispatched to exam centres at 8.00 am under tight police security. There is no way the question papers could have been leaked as the packets were opened in the presence of officials,” Mr Patra said.
“It is being verified whether the leaked question paper is of this year or previous years. Allegations of question paper leak in Kandhamal and other places are also not true,” added Mr Patra.
Meanwhile, Congress media cell head Satya Prakash Nayak said: “It is very unfortunate. Leak of question papers of Matric and Plus II examinations has become an annual affair now. They are playing with the future of students. The government is only claiming in front of the media that they have taken steps for foolproof security. We want a probe into the matter and immediate action should be taken against the high officials of the department.”
