Ugly development at exam centre: Student violence

Student violence. Nothing more and nothing less than this. It was plain violence in all its ugliness and there can be no ground to offer any excuses. What makes the violence at Lilong Higher Secondary Madrassa on March 5 stand out from the universal understanding of student violence is the fact that nothing political can be read into the ugly manifestation of students donning the role of hoodlums. A trait that one would identify with some B Grade films from the Mumbai film industry. It was plain and simple. Students suddenly overturning desks, benches and creating mayhem, once the final bell was rung and here is a case of students giving in to their baser instinct. The students are still young and there should be time to mend them and perhaps the best way to mend them would be to penalise them heavily and ring out the message that they cannot get away with everything. No definite reasons have been spelt out on why the students suddenly decided to act like goons, but reports coming in from the said school say that the students were peeved as they had lost around 30 minutes due to all the checkings conducted by the school and the flying squads of the Board of Secondary Education, Manipur and the Invigilator allegedly went back on his word to give them grace time to make up for the time lost. Even if this version is true, this does not give them the license to give in to their baser instinct and let mayhem rule the roost. One teacher injured, more than twenty students injured and vehicles of teachers and officials of the Board kept parked inside the compound of the school damaged.
The infamy is complete. Even as mayhem ruled the roost at the said Madrassa, the Democratic Students’ Alliance of Manipur (DESAM) dropped a sort of a bomb shell in claiming that the MIL question paper was leaked well ahead of the examination yesterday. The claim of DESAM definitely gains credence given the fact that the Secretary of BSEM has notified that a case has been registered with the Cyber Crime branch and necessary investigation has been launched. The Class X question leakage claim comes close on the question leak case of the Class XI examinations conducted by the Council of Higher Secondary Education, Manipur (COHSEM) a few days back. Juxtapose these ugly cases with the uproar at the said Madrassa which was an examination centre for the Class X examination and it is more than clear that there are elements out there who are intent on discrediting anything that stands for education. Legal action, this is what BSEM has assured and one hopes that fitting action is taken up against all those who created mayhem in the garb of students. Let an example be set that the State Government cannot just sit back and watch young students act like ruffians and that too at an examination centre.