Teacher owns up to writing Plus-2 exam for students

Kozhikode: The police is yet to register a criminal case into the alleged impersonation by a teacher on behalf of students in the Plus-2 final examinations. An inquiry has been ordered after it was found that Nishad V Mohammed, a school teacher of a government higher secondary school at Neeleswaram in Kozhikode district, wrote exam for Plus-2 students and corrected the answer sheets.

On Thursday, the education department hinted that police case would be registered against the teacher for impersonation. However, Kozhikode rural SP U Abdul Karim told Onmanorama that he was yet to receive any communication from the education department to take action against the teachers.

“The higher officials at the higher secondary directorate informed that they would direct the Deputy Director of Education (Kozhikode) to notify police regarding the same. As soon as their complaint is received, we would register case on impersonation and other criminal activity including production of fake documents,” the district police chief said.

Meanwhile, the officials from the Special Branch already visited the school, but they did not question any of the teachers or office staff there.

The Directorate of Higher Secondary Education has already ordered for a departmental inquiry, while the police would investigate impersonation.

If the students were not found to have any role in the incident, they would be given a second opportunity to write the exams, it was learnt.

Nishad, who has confessed to his crime, however claimed that he was only helping students who had learning disabilities. The teacher, who was also the additional deputy chief of examinations, said that he was not trying to make any financial gains.

The suspect teacher likely wrote the plus two English paper of two students and the Computer Science paper for two others. Moreover, it is suspected the answer sheets of 32 students were corrected.

Chance discovery

The malpractice was spotted during valuation as handwriting on answer sheets of different students appeared to be the same. Then the answer sheets of other subjects of the same students were compared. These checks confirmed that the exams were not written by the students but some one else.

Exam board secretary Dr S S Vivekanandan then summoned the students to check their handwritings. However, only school principal and deputy chief of examinations turned up. The accused teacher did not come.

In the investigation that followed, it was found that the accused teacher, with the help of chief superintendent, had written the exams in the school office. Deputy chief of examinations P K Faizal and chief superintendent K Rasiya have been suspended. Faizal is the principal of the Neeleswaram school and Rasiya is a teacher at a government higher secondary school in Chennamangaloor. (Both Neeleswaram and Chennamangaloor are in Kozhikode district.)

Nishad has said that an appeal would be filed against his suspension.

The teachers' organisations of the UDF that planned protests in light of the fraud called them off after the suspect teachers were suspended.