Mass cheating in Haryana Board exams: stringent laws need of the hour, say experts

Security personnel check the admit cards of students before their Class X board exam, conducted by Haryana Board of School Education, in Gurugram on March 3, 2025.
| Photo Credit: PTI

Question papers getting leaked at multiple examination centres, outsiders thronging centres to facilitate mass cheating and imposters appearing for candidates have marred the conduct of the Haryana State Education Board (HSEB) examinations for Class X and XII. The exams for both classes, which are being held from February 27 to March 29, for regular students and the Haryana Open School, are currently being conducted at around 1,500 centres across the State.

The use of unfair means by the studentsduring the State board exams is not unusual , but many have found the audacity with which locals barged inside examination centres at a few places — recorded in viral videos and images — despite police presence, shocking.

The events of the first day

On February 27, the very first day of the Class XII board exams, the English question paper got leaked at centres in Nuh and Palwal within minutes of the exam’s commencement. Some outsiders allegedly barged inside the centre to take pictures of the question paper from the window and shared them on social media platform.

Four invigilators were dismissed and First Information Reports were filed in the matter .

On February 28, the Maths question paper of the Class X board exam was leaked at centres in Jhajjar and Nuh. FIRs were registered in connection to this incident too.

A day later, 25 police personnel, including four Deputy Superintendents of Police and three Station House Officers in Nuh, were suspended and the HSEB secretary was replaced.

Blaming the situation on the government’s lack of will power, Suraj Bhan, a former District Education Officer (DEO), said that the menace of cheating was not confined to mere board exams, as several competitive exams too had to be cancelled over the past years after their question papers got leaked.

Instead of a knee-jerk reaction like suspending and replacing officials, Suraj Bhan, a former District Education Officer (DEO) stressed that what is needed is a multi-pronged strategy to ensure quality education with better infrastructure, including filling all vacant posts of teaching staff, and strict legal action against students resorting to cheating. Existing anti-cheating laws seem to “encourage” the use of unfair means instead of acting as a “deterrent”, Mr. Bhan said.

Frequently offending districts

Though cases of cheating are being reported from across the State, the names of some of the districts — Bhiwani, Jind, Jhajjar, Sonipat and Nuh — have come up more often than most.

Mr. Bhan, who was posted in several of these places, including Nuh, said the district was among the ones with the highest number of enrolments in government schools, but a large number of posts for teachers were lying vacant. “While there are schools with surplus staff, many don’t have the requisite number of teachers. The government can authorise the Deputy Commissioner or the DEO to transfer teachers within the district to fix this anomaly,” he suggested.

Anoop Singh Jakhar, another retired DEO, pointed out that around half of the districts did not have a full-time DEO or the District Elementary Education Officer, to monitor the schools and the teachers on a regular basis. “How can there be supervision with no full-time DEO? In many cases, the DEOs are handling more than one district, making it difficult for them to ensure effective monitoring. The regular monitoring is a must to address teachers’ grievances and ensure quality education,” Mr. Jakhar said.

He also suggested that the number of flying squads be increased so that each squad monitors three examination centres only. Daily rotation of the centres under the Squads and holding them accountable for any illegal practices there would make a huge difference, he added.

A flying squad is a team of officials, who are empowered to physically check any candidate suspected of using unfair means.

DEO Faridabad, Ajit Sheoran, who has been given the additional charge of Nuh, said the number of invigilators at the 11 “sensitive” and 27 “supersensitive” examination centres in the district were increased by two each, following the pattern of Central Board of Secondary Education. The strength of the supervisory staff has also been doubled. “After the question papers were leaked on two consecutive days, the security around the examination centres has been stepped up. Police personnel are now deployed on the terraces of the exam centres and nearby houses. More than those inside, it is the crowd outside which is responsible for facilitating cheating,” said Mr. Sheoran.

“A meeting was also held with sarpanches to seek their support to control the crowd. We have kept strict vigil with drones,” he added.

The current HSEB secretary Munish Nagpal told The Hindu over phone that 246 flying squads have now been deployed along a particular route to monitor six centres every day. Their routes are also being rotated on a daily basis, he added. Mr. Nagpal said nodal officials have been appointed at the district level for better co-ordination with the flying squads. “After the first two days, the situation has improved considerably. We have registered 250 ‘unfair means cases so far, with only nine being registered on March 6,” said Mr. Nagpal.