Bhubaneswar, Sep 2 (IANS): The Odisha government on Wednesday requested the University Grants Commission (UGC) to extend the deadline for completion of all Undergraduate (UG) and Post-graduate (PG) final semester examinations till October 10.

In a letter, Higher Education Secretary Saswat Mishra requested the UGC to extend the deadline of September 30 for completion of all UG and PG final semester exams till October 10.

He said keeping the Covid-19 pandemic in view, it was necessary to conduct the exams with gaps.

"Conducting multiple examinations on a single day would lead to congregation of large number of students in the examination centre which will make compliance of Covid-19 prevention protocol difficult," said Mishra.

Conducting the examination everyday without any gap will lead to centres not getting time to disinfect the premises.

The extension of date will ensure scheduling of exams with at least a one day gap so that exam centres can be sanitized properly, he added.