Vedant Shrivastava, who recently questioned the CBSE’s motives and readiness in implementing the On-Screen Marking System (OSM) for the Class 12 Board examinations, met with Opposition Leader Rahul Gandhi. During their conversation, they discussed the labels often directed at them, including accusations of being “anti-national,” “deep state operatives,” or even “Pakistanis.”
In a post on X, Rahul Gandhi said, “A revealing chat with my fellow “anti-national Soros agents. Vedant and his friends are brilliant, brave young Indians who asked CBSE and the Modi government simple questions – but got insults instead of answers. They deserve a bright and secure future. We will make sure they get it.”
In a 90-second video clip, which appeared to be part of a longer recording that had not yet been released as of May 31, Gandhi asked Vedant and others whether they were familiar with such allegations.
Watch the video here:
A Class 12 student, Vedant Shrivastava, previously gained widespread attention after claiming that the Physics answer sheet provided by the Central Board of Secondary Education during the revaluation process did not belong to him. Other students, including Sanjana, also shared similar concerns on social media.
In response, the CBSE contacted the affected students and supplied what it said were their correct answer sheets. The board stated that complaints involving alleged answer-sheet mismatches and other revaluation-related issues were being handled on a priority basis.
Meanwhile, Coempt has come under criticism from Rahul Gandhi, who alleged that the company had previously faced controversies when it operated under the name Globarena.
Gandhi has called for an independent judicial investigation as well as a Special Investigation Team (SIT) probe to uncover the facts behind what he described as the “entire scam.” He also questioned why a company with a controversial track record in Telangana was awarded the contract by the CBSE.
Here’s what students allege
CBSE tweets, “We have been closely monitoring the vulnerabilities in the OnMark portal of our service provider that are being flagged in the public domain. An expert team of cybersecurity professionals has been deployed over the last few days from across various arms of the government as well as the IITs to fortify these systems, including taking them over to a more secure set up. The identified vulnerabilities have been contained, and other exploitable weaknesses are being ruled out. We are grateful to all alert citizens and ethical hackers pointing out such weaknesses, and have gotten in touch with some of them directly…”
CBSE detected around 20 answer-sheet mix-up cases on OSM portal
Government sources told ANI on Friday that the CBSE’s first-time implementation of the OSM system this year led to around 20 instances of answer-sheet mismatches. In addition, nearly 13,000 answer sheets could not be processed through the digital evaluation system and had to be assessed manually. The issues have raised concerns about the rollout and execution of the new marking process.
“There was a case of Vedant. Vedant got the answer sheet, and to his horror, he discovered that this was not his answer sheet. There was a mix-up in scanning… There was a girl called Sanjana too,” the sources told ANI.
“In some cases, there was a mix-up in scanning. Such cases are around 20. Students pointed it out after accessing their answer sheets,” the sources told ANI.
According to them, Coempt and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) qualified technically in the final round of bidding, with Coempt emerging as the lowest bidder after quoting around ₹24.75 per answer booklet compared to TCS’ approximately ₹65.
“When the tender was floated for the third time, two companies — Coempt and TCS — qualified technically. When the financial bids were opened, Coempt had quoted approximately ₹24.75 per answer booklet inclusive of taxes, while TCS had quoted around ₹65-66 without taxes,” the sources told ANI.
The leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha has demanded an independent judicial probe, as well as an SIT, to unearth the truth behind the “entire scam”, and asked why a firm that had a murky past in Telangana handed the contract to the board.
(With inputs from agencies)
