Sidharth Pandey - NDTV
New Delhi, May 19: With stories of entrance examination papers for IIMs, IITs and the UPSC being leaked and dozens of instances of cheating, can the country's National Open School be far behind?
But when NDTV investigated, the scale of the massive cheating without the fear of being caught and teachers and coaching centres helping students cheat was stunning.
The students and teachers of the National Open School were caught on camera, openly cheating. But after the NDTV report, a national school official has been suspended.
Farce of an exam
The open school, which can be joined after class VII, sees students competing with those from the CBSE and ICSE streams for admissions into colleges.
Thirteen-and-a-half lakh students in India do open schooling. The degree they get is the equivalent of a CBSE or ICSE certificate. The government runs this system, the National Open School.
Open school students study by themselves through correspondence courses and twice a year, they arrive at centres to take their exams. But their exams are a complete farce.
Blatant cheating
Students cheat blatantly and fearlessly. Their partners in crime are teachers and other authorities. At the Soni International school in Haryana's Badhurgarh, Class X students appeared for the open school Maths exam.
Usually, a Maths exam intimidates even the brightest students but the students here were bursting with confidence. With good reason. Three versions of the exam were handed out to prevent cheating.
But within half an hour, all three versions of the paper were taken outside by students where friends, families and tutors came together to solve them.
NDTV: Which set do you have?
Relatives of cheaters: A
NDTV: Where is set C?
Relatives of cheaters: Over that side. They just took it there.
Everyone pitched in. Some teams were assigned to look out for the police. Others ferried the answers to students.
With everyone else taking their exam for them, students had three hours to kill. Some spent their time staring into space. Others headed out for a leisurely stroll, collected the answers from their ghostwriters and then came back just in time to hand in their sheets.
Silent spectators
The invigilators were silent spectators, looking on as papers came back in through windows. But not all teachers were passive players in this game.
Students can enroll in the open school system from class VII onwards. They get study material through post and can attend up to 35 classes at private schools affiliated with the open school system.
The government hires 150 employees to conduct open school exams. Among them is Krishan Pal.
On April 28, Pal conducted the Class X science practical exam for NIOS at a prestigious South Delhi school.
Armed with a hidden camera, NDTV asked him why that practical exam was not being conducted in a lab.
NDTV: Is there no lab?
Pal: Actually all the kids here do not know how to do the practicals in the lab, so we have to do it and tell them.
So how much is Mr Pal willing to bend the rules? He allowed students to copy from each other. One student copied the answer sheet of another student who had already completed their exam.
Pal also gave students extra time and chipped in with his own answers. The open school system functions like an educational black-market. Money can buy you the sort of marks you could only dream of getting.
Om Prakash conducts coaching classes in Delhi for NIOS students for just Rs 250 a month. If you sign up for those he will ensure that you are allowed to cheat during your exams.
Hand-in-glove
The teacher in question works at a prominent school in South Delhi. She was also going to invigilate the open school exams.
Om Prakash: I can give you 20-25,000 every month. You should have an OK setting and don't worry. No one will get to you; there will be no link to you.
Teacher: If I take part, how much can I earn?
Om Prakash: Lakhs.
Om Prakash explained that he has set up similar arrangements at several other schools.
"We have a direct setting with the co-ordinator in other schools. They hand over the rooms to us and tell us which are the students. We then go about solving their exam papers and keep a look out for the flying squad. "No one can check. By the way even if they are caught by the flying squad we still have ways of fixing things after that," said Om Prakash.
But Om Prakash's luck ran out eventually and during a raid he was caught helping students to cheat. He has since been suspended.
On the basis of several complaints filed by students and parents the government is trying to clean up the open school system. The makeover is long overdue.
Allotted a classroom all to herself one person was caught copying answers for her Economics exam. Caught red-handed her revelation shocked everyone.
"Sir, I am a teacher. Let me go," she said. She was not lying. She was a teacher and was busy copying answers for a student.
There is another side to the story, that of honest students who are frustrated with what they see and hear. They say they deserve a fair system and a decent education which is why they signed up for open school in the first place.
What is especially disturbing is that open school students compete with ICSE and CBSE students for college admissions. So their cheating which leads to high marks affects the lives of thousands of other students. So the open school system is failing both those within it and those outside it.